Alex Murdaugh's brother, former law partner sue him over unpaid loans - ABC NEWS 4

Lawsuits filed as alleged victims ask court to lock down Murdaugh finances & assets

As Alex Murdaugh's many alleged victims argue for courts to freeze his assets so they get a fair reward in any future civil judgments against him, the disgraced attorney now has two other noteworthy plaintiffs coming after money. And Alex knows them well.

One is Alex's own brother, Randolph "Randy" Murdaugh IV. The other is John E. Parker, powerhouse attorney and president of Alex's former law firm, Peters Murdaugh Parker Eltzroth & Detrick (PMPED) in Hampton.

Randy Murdaugh and John E. Parker filed debt collection lawsuits against Alex on Thursday and Friday of this week in Hampton County court.

Alex owes his brother and former partner a combined $523,500 in unpaid personal debts, according to the complaints filed this week.

Randy Murdaugh in his suit gives a detailed breakdown of the $46,500 he claims his brother owes him. Parker, meanwhile, is decidedly vague in his accounting of $477,000 he alleges he loaned Alex.

Parker says he he gave Alex Murdaugh three loans between March and July of 2021 — $150,000 in March, $77,000 in May, and $250,000 in July. He gives no further details besides the fact that money hasn't been paid back, however.

Each of these substantial loans came in the months immediately before and after Alex's wife, Maggie (52), and son, Paul (22), were murdered outside the family's home in the secluded Moselle community in Colleton County, June 7, 2021.

Randy, meanwhile, says he first gave Alex a loan ($75,000) to cover an overdrawn bank account on Sept. 2, 2021. That's the day before PMPED forced Alex to resign for stealing money from the firm and its clients.

Randy's next loan to Alex came four days later, when Randy says he drove Alex to check into a drug rehabilitation facility out of state. Randy says Alex asked him to loan him the $15,000 it would cost to enroll in the rehab clinic, and Randy says he agreed.

Alex's years-long addiction to prescription pain pills had been revealed in the days since his ouster from PMPED. This came to light while Alex was in the hospital nursing a reported gunshot wound to the head he suffered on Sept. 4 — just one day after his forced resignation from the law firm his family helped build.

Alex initially said he suffered the gunshot at the hands of a stranger while dealing with a flat tire along a rural stretch of highway outside the town of Varnville.

Later, however, Alex confessed it had all been part of a failed assisted suicide plot and life insurance fraud scheme involving friend, former client and alleged personal drug dealer, Curtis "Eddie" Smith. Smith claims it was a setup, and that he didn't shoot Alex.

As for the money Randy says Alex owes him, he claims to have deducted $43,500 from an original $90,000 in exchange for a tractor and a brush clearing implement he got from Alex.

In addition to the two lawsuits in Hampton County, the PMPED law firm earlier in October filed its own lawsuit against Alex Murdaugh in Colleton County in connection to the money partners claim Alex embezzled from the firm and converted to personal use.

Those three pending lawsuits come as attorneys for several victims in pending civil litigation against Alex Murdaugh seek to have his finances locked down and overseen by court-appointed supervisors.

The estate of former Murdaugh housekeeper Gloria Satterfield, the estate of 2019 Beaufort County boat crash victim Mallory Beach, and boat crash survivor Connor Cook each filed identical petitions last week asking judges to essentially freeze Murdaugh's assets.

The three plaintiffs, each with their own pending lawsuits against Alex Murdaugh, say Alex Murdaugh via his surviving son, Buster, appears to be trying to sell off many of his highly valuable assets in an attempt to dilute and obscure his true wealth to limit what the family pays in future possible judgments against them.

Cook, the Beach family and the Satterfield family provided evidence showing that after Alex turned over his power of attorney to Buster in September, the family appeared to be divesting itself of cash and assets.

First, a nearly million-dollar mortgage was promptly paid off. Then a home on Edisto Beach worth more than $600,000 was allowed to go up for sale for unpaid taxes. Next, Alex's roughly $200,000-plus stake in a high-dollar Jasper County hunting club was sold. Alex's 31-foot Grady White center console boat was listed for sale at $115,000 soon after.

Meantime, Buster was spotted in Las Vegas gambling, court documents show.

“There is clearly an attempt to hide assets, there is an attempt to secret assets awa,y and this is not a case where there is not enough money," said Mark Tinsley, the attorney for the estate of Mallory Beach. "This is a case where whatever there is, is being hidden."

Tinsley, along with Cook's attorney Joe McCullough and Satterfield's attorney Eric Bland, have asked Judge Dan Hall to appoint former U.S. Attorney Peter McCoy and respected Columbia business attorney John T. Lay as co-receivers (managers) of the Murdaugh's finances.

The attorneys say they've all had a difficult time getting the Murdaughs to be forthright in their financial statements related to their individual trials.

“If you had nothing to hide, you would turn it over. You would comply with the rules," said Bland. "There is a reason he does not respond, because they do have something to hide.”

Hall on Friday delayed a decision until next week on whether or not to freeze Murdaugh's assets and place the two recommended attorneys in charge.

Alex Murdaugh remains the focus of several pending criminal investigations in addition to the civil lawsuits. The criminal probes involving him include:

• The death of his wife and son, Maggie and Paul.
• The potential obstruction of justice in the aftermath of the February 2019 boat crash that killed Mallory Beach and injured Connor Cook.

Additionally, the Post and Courier this week reports a grand jury has been convened and witnesses called in connection to possible drug smuggling activities linked to other criminal cases involving Murdaugh.

The Post and Courier also reports federal investigators including the U.S. Attorney's Office and FBI are involved in investigations of Alex Murdaugh's alleged financial crimes.

Murdaugh is in jail in Columbia without bond after his arrest earlier this month on criminal charges related to the Gloria Satterfield case.

source: https://abcnews4.com/news/local/alex-murdaughs-brother-former-law-partner-sue-him-over-unpaid-loans

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