. those smiles. that's why i do what i do. that and the paycheck. . good evening. we begin with breaking news. after just about three hours of deliberation, jurors reached a

verdict in the alex murdaugh double murder trial. >> guilty verdict. verdict, guilty. verdict, guilty. verdict, guilty. >> convictions on all four charges against him including two counts of first-degree murder in the killings of his wife margaret and his son paul in july 2021. you see him being led away there, put in a van. taken from the courthouse. moments ago, that occurred. we're waiting for a conscience ever conference with the prosecution. it's extraordinary how quickly the jury came to this verdict. what was it like in the courtroom when the verdicts were read? >> reporter: yeah, it took them just about three and a half hours or so to find alex murdaugh guilty on all four counts. you try to read the jury as they file back into the courtroom. none of them looked to the right where murdaugh sat and the family sat.

they all had their heads down as they walked into the courtroom. also, anderson, you could see alex murdaugh -- we have this presser that is just about to start hear. that would be the, that's the south carolina attorney general, allen wilson, at the podium. he actually questioned one of the last witnesses, anderson, because that was a very important witness. a key witness. he was speaking to how the crime scene, how it all happened. he was a crime scene expert on the re-creation of the crime scene and able to help the jury understand how the defense's theory could not have worked. so we can listen in here. >> i want to thank every one of you for being here tonight. there is a lot of emotion at this courthouse. a year and a half, nearly two years of blood, sweat and tears. a lot of hard work for so many people. if you will just bear with me, a couple -- not a couple.

a lot of people to thank. first, for those who don't know, i'm south carolina's attorney general and i have the best staff of any attorney general in the united states of america. i'm going to start by thanking our prosecution team. i've been here for nearly six weeks with this team living in a hotel. and it felt almost like being in a dorm environment in college. late nights, cramming, studying, little sleep, away from our families, getting up early, getting here to the courthouse, working long hours, getting on each other's nerves at times. it was all worth it. it was all worth it. we got to bring justice and be a voice for maggie and paul murdaugh and bring justice for the people of south carolina. i would like the start beefly by thanking our team. excuse me. put my classes on. our chief prosecutor, i appointed clayton waters to be the chief prosecutor nearly a year and a half ago. i want to say, i'm pretty brilliant.

i picked the right guy. i want to say thank you. you did a fantastic job. i don't think there was another attorney in the state of south carolina that could have led this hurculean effort. i want to thank crayton's boss. he's been in the attorney general's office for over 40 years, sitting here the my left. don, thank you. john, many of you got to see him doing the closing argument today. you've been a phenomenal add to our team. i'm going to go through the names. please raise your hand. you know crayton, you saw john, john conrad, johnny james. savannah. ozzy toledo. shane, carly, carson burnie,

danielle colon, and our victim's advocate, tricia allen. i want to say thank you to the south carolina law enforcement division, mark hill assigned some amazing men and women. when i say it was an agency-wide effort, i can't underscore that enough. every time i called the chief, every time i reached out to the lead agents. hey, general, we need something. we would reach out and they were there. they busted their butts. i can't butts. i can't begin to list every agent. i told them i wasn't going to mention their names, but we would not be here if it wasn't for sled. i want to thank mark keel and his team and all the men and women across the state law enforcement division for what they did to make tonight a possibility. i also want to thank the fbi and the secret service, our federal partners. we had to utilize many of their

assets and resources. we couldn't do all the things we did without our federal partners. we had a lot of local partners. we had the colleton county sheriff's department, buddy hill and his team providing the security. they did a phenomenal job. they were there. they were first responders on june 27, when maggie and paul were butchered brutally. they were the first responders, and they were the first ones to be there. the charleston county sheriff's office, the orangeburg county sheriff's office were instrumental in supporting our investigative efforts. you all know kenny kenzie, our chief crime scene expert with the orangeburg sheriff's office. i also want to thank the city of walterboro. i think the mayor is here somewhere, and the police department. they provided security. thank you. this whole community has embraced our entire team. and i cannot thank you enough. we've all been away from our families, two hours away from our families for the past two

months. and it's this community, we would walk into restaurants and people would walk to us and thank us. you have no idea how good that makes people feel when they're under an incredible amount of stress and scrutiny. and that community really, really embraced us. i want to thank the colleton county clerk of court, becky hill and her entire team and their staff. [ applause ] i call her becky boo. but madam clerk, wherever you are tonight. i'm sorry. that's my pet name for her. but i want to thank you, madam clerk, for you, the entire team, the bailiffs, the court security, the staff here. there was no role that was too small that they weren't willing to do for us. the security team here. it was a herculean effort by everybody. and i can't thank enough people.

i don't know if i mentioned the bailiffs, but i want to thank them. and there is another group of people who -- you don't know who they are, but that's the jurors. not just the jurors, but the alternates, the ones who didn't get to serve to the very end, but people taken away from their families. i want to thank the families of our jurors who sat here every single day for what seemed like long amounts of tedious, monotonous evidence. sometimes people didn't know what it meant. they didn't understand it, and they had to sit there and process it and hear it over and over and over again. and i want to thank these nameless jurors whose identities have been protected. they may make their identities available to all you have at some point. but they sat there and delivered justice tonight. and i want to thank them for their role in their process. you know, winston churchill said "democracy is the worst form of government, except for every

other kind." i want to adopt that and say we may have the worst criminal justice system in the world, but it's better than every other kind there is. and our criminal justice system worked tonight. it gave a voice to maggie and paul murdaugh. who were brutally mowed down and murdered on the night of june 7th, 2021 by someone that they loved and someone that they trusted. and they couldn't be here to testify for themselves tonight. their testimony came through the evidence and the information that was gathered by the men and women or the agencies i've just mentioned. it came from the testimony of the agents and the investigators and the attorneys and the folks in our staff who were able to get to it the court record. and so i want to say tonight, their voice was heard tonight and justice was brought for them. we can't bring them back, but we can bring them justice. i started off my remarks by saying it is a good day in south carolina.

today's verdict proves that no one, no one, no matter who you are in society, is above the law. a lot of people doubted that this process would work, and hopefully for those who did doubt the process, hopefully, we have instilled and put a little bit of faith back into you and your lives as you view this process as it unfolds. i am proud of this team. i am proud of the men and women standing behind me tonight, and there has been a lot of emotion. and i just want to say from the bottom of my heart, i saw firsthand for the last five or six weeks the countless nights where you were up beyond midnight, and you were getting up before dawn, not eating. i was watching nancy grace the other night and i heard her call creighton pale and gone, because creighton wasn't eating and sleeping. he really wasn't, folks. i'm serious. we would have to bring him kind

bars and things to eat during breaks. but creighton, herculean effort, my friend. and i am truly honored to have you on or team. thanks for being a great leader and great chief prosecutor, and i would like to invite you to come up and make some remarks to the folks tonight. >> thanks, everybody. [ applause ] i want to start by thanking this guy who has given me and all these folks behind us opportunities to do justice, which is what we want to do with our careers. it is very tough and demanding, but it's rewarding for moments like these. the general stole a lot of my lines, but i also want to thank the jurors for their long and arduous service. and we had no doubt that if we had a chance to present our case in a court of law, that they would see through the one last con that alex murdaugh was trying to pull, and they did. and we're so grateful for that.

i get to lead the state grand jury section in the attorney general's office. this particular case is not a state grand jury case. there are other indictments that are state grand jury. but the one thing about that is that i have an amazing team. and i want to be clear. this was a team effort. y'all saw all of these folks behind me, doing amazing work. and i can't be prouder of a team in my life. we called this our super bowl, and not because of the media attention, but just because of the effort that we knew that we would have to put into this. and we didn't really get to watch much of the super bowl that went on, because when we arrived, i think it was winter, and it feels like spring now. but every single member of this team, every single member of the state grand jury staff, what we do well is work together as a team in complex investigations. and who we work with is my partners at sled. and i can't thank them enough as well, because we're used to working on these complex cases and working together.

and i'm not leaving out sheriff hill and the colleton county sheriff's office and our federal partners in orangeburg and charleston sheriff's office and all the other agencies that have worked on this case. i also want to thank miss becky, if she is still up there, because she has been amazing. the clerk staff has been amazing. the court staff has been amazing. the bailiffs have been amazing. and again, i also want to thank this community that really has embraced us and has been so great to us and made us able to survive this process that has been long and arduous. and i have been sleeping. i have been eating more than kind bars every now and then. but -- and i'm sure that's a nice plug for kind. but any way, it really has been a great process. we will have sentencing tomorrow. obviously we're not going to comment on sentencing, because that's still pending. but justice was done today. it doesn't matter who your

family is. it doesn't matter how much money you have or people think you have. it doesn't matter what you think how prominent you are. if you do wrong, if you break the law, if you murder, then justice will be done in south carolina. and i think south carolina has shown to the nation and the world how a process can work and work well. thank you, all. [ applause ] >> and also, i want to thank creighton. i told creighton, i'm going to come down and be just a staff attorney. i know i'm your boss. i'm your boss's boss's boss. i said i'm going to come down and i'm going help. i'm going to follow instruction. and i hope i was true to my word. this past weekend i'll say what can i do to help? i'm willing to take a witness if it will help. he said actually, it would. so he let an old prosecutor dust off his cleats and get back in the game to help the team out.

>> i got to be the boss of the boss for a while. >> don't get used to it! no, in all seriousness, i'm proud of the decisions that i made in putting the people behind me into the left and right of me in charge of this case. and i was honored to be part of this team. just another member, just another worker be in the trenches trying to bring justice to the people of this state and to bring people to the people who couldn't be here tonight because they were brutally murdered by someone they trusted. now with that being said, i know a lot of people want to talk to us, a lot of people want to talk to some of the attorneys and the support staff and the agents, investigators here tonight. some of you want the talk to me, and others, we're going make ourselves available to you. but like mr. waters just said, tomorrow there is a sentencing hearing, and we don't want the get out in front of our skis. and plus, i'm starting to feel the rain come down. but i promise you, we're going to make ourselves available to talk to members of the media, to talk to all of you out there that have questions. we'll answer any questions that

we ethically can. we hope you'll continue to be patient with us as we finish this process tomorrow. again, we're going to go back and get a good night sleep tonight. but thank you. also, one last group that we didn't thank, the media. you all -- i know a lot of people in this polarizing world we live in, a lot of people take shots a the media, but the media was incredibly respectful. you were so good not just to us, but listen, to the families of the victims, okay. i know this is an awkward situation. but you protected the identities of people and you protected the process. and i want to thank you for your part in this and telling the stories, educating the public on what's going on out there. so now i'm going to stop speaking as an attorney general and close as a father and a as a husband to say when you go home tonight, hug your loved ones. hug your spouse. hug your children because this

case if it reminds us of anything, that you can't take for granted that people in your family are always going to be there. and right now when i get home tomorrow, i'm going hug mine, and i hope you hug yours. thank you again. thank you for your prayers. thank you for your players. you came and prayed for me. i see a lot of people say we're praying for you. we appreciate your prayers. thank you all so much. and this is going to conclude this press conference. we look forward to talking to all of you tomorrow. thank you. >> south carolina attorney general alan wilson. and also the lead prosecutor creighton waters alongside other members of the prosecution speaking tonight in walterboro, south carolina. the two thanking numerous people, praising the criminal justice system that has delivered tonight's verdict. our randi kaye is on the scene at the courthouse. she has been covering the trial all along. also joining us tonight a team of legal experts, mark o'mara, cnn chief law enforcement intelligence analyst, jessica roth who currently teaches at new york's cardoza school of law, joey jackson, jury

consultant jill huntley taylor. jessica, let me start off with everybody here. did you have any idea it would be this quick, the deliberations and that result? >> i'm not surprised by the result. i am surprised by the speed. in fact, i'm shocked by the speed. i never anticipated that we would have a guilty verdict within three hours. thinking was a complex trial with a lot of witnesses, a lot of evidence. >> well what the speed suggests to me is the jury didn't see i as being that complicated at all, actually. and at the end of the day, it was pretty straight forward. it really amounted to video of the defendant at the kennels that was on paul's phone that he didn't know existed until fairly recently. the lie that he told to the police officers about not being at the kennels, even though he was caught on the videotape being at the kennels, and the timeline. the fact that he had the opportunity to commit the murder, and really, nobody else plausibly did. that's what it came down to. that's pretty straight forward. >> we're showing you that video. okay. as soon as we have the sound of it, we'll show it to you in

full. oh, here, you can see. >> come here. come here! >> let's talk about the importance of this video. this was a video that alex murdaugh did not know existed until into the trial, at some point in the investigation. this was -- this was his son's testimony essentially. this proved that alex murdaugh was at the scene very close to the killings. >> yeah. damning evidence. and when you spin a narrative and you don't know what lies around the corner that might contradict the narrative you're spinning, which is i wasn't there, it becomes a problem. why would you say you weren't there? what movies would you have to lie? and so when you have the video, which connects him to the scene, the prosecution talked a lot about something we all lawyers talk about, common sense. what is the human element and human factor.

what do we experience every day as people? and ultimately, they said you know what? he lied before. he continues to lie. he looked his clients in the eye and lied to them. he is lying to us. he is guilty. that's what they said. >> we have some video of in the courtroom people identifying the voice on that video, because in the background, you hear alex murdaugh speaking. and that is what the evidence showed, that he was at the scene. the defense contradicted that, said it was not alex murdaugh's voice. let's listen to some of the testimony. >> and did you hear -- recognize the voices on there? >> i did. >> did you recognize the voices of your second family? >> did. >> and what did voices did you hear? >> paul's, miss maggie. >> and how sure you now? >> positive. >> 100%? >> that's correct. >> mark o'mara, he -- alex murdaugh essentially had to take the witness stand in order to clear this up and to change his

story and to say that he had been lying. >> that one piece of evidence may have been the tipping point for why he had to get on the stand. as joey knows, we all know, it is very difficult to put a criminal defendant on the stand because they can be the state's best witness. turned out to be in this case exactly that. and without that video, there may have been a balancing of not putting him on the stand and submitting him to cross-examination. but he had to explain away this video. like you said, this was paul's testimony, and it was the testimony of the jury to listen to very loudly, very clearly, and with a three-hour verdict very quickly. >> john, are you surprised? >> well, no. because i watched much of the trial. but the second thing is when you have a criminal trial and you have a fast verdict often, that is a verdict in favor of the prosecution in my experience, but you look at the case. it's a circumstantial case. the alternative theory to the circumstantial case was pretty

weak. and you have a defendant who is on the stand who is established in that story line as being a liar, a cheater, and someone who steals. and when he takes the stand, a lot of that is riding on his credibility. so there were a number of factors here that made a case that had its weak spots really hard to get around. >> in terms of sentencing, and that's -- what does the judge take into account? >> well, the judge is going to take into account first and foremost the evidence that was introduced at the case about the murders, the fax and circumstances, the manner of the killing. the judge already tipped his hand a bit today by saying after the verdict came in when he was denying the defense motion to set aside the verdict based on insufficient evidence, that he thought the evidence was overwhelming. and i thought the judge who had been really so sort of even tempered and calm throughout the trial, he remained calm, but i thought he short of showed his

view of the evidence at last and when he characterized it as overwhelming. >> we actually heard from buster murdaugh, the only surviving son of alex murdaugh. i want to play just a little bit of him on the stand, if we had that video. >> do you remember that? >> yes, sir. >> do you recognize your dad's voice? >> i do. >> if you listen to it, would you be able to tell the jury whether it's i or they? >> yes, sir. >> your honor, pull up exhibit 153, the clip. >> so bad. >> what did your dad say? >> they did them so bad. >> is that the first time you heard him say "they did them so bad". >> no, sir. >> when is the first time you heard him say "they did them so bad". >> the first time i heard him say that was the night i went down the night of june 7th. >> did he say that more than one time? >> he did.

>> one second, your honor. let me check to see what i left out. >> just very briefly, buster, you've heard testimony during this trial that your dad was stealing money from clients. >> yes, sir. >> did you know anything about that? >> no, sir. >> okay. and just lastly, roughly how long would it take to clean a dog run down at the kennels? two dog runs, for example? >> roughly i'd say 10 minutes or so. >> what do you have to do? >> you got to get the hose, turn the hose on, spray out the dog kennels. you have to put the bed on top of the wooden box so the bed's not wet. >> now what are you spraying?

dog manure? >> yeah. spraying dog poop. >> and it sprays out? >> you have to spray it, make sure it's all out of there, spray to it the back. >> thank you. that's all i have, your honor. >> joey, what's interesting about hearing from buster murdaugh, and again video playing such a crucial role, whether or not alex murdaugh, it will be interesting to see whether the jury believed that alex murdaugh was saying "i did them so bad" or if this turned out to be an important piece. >> listen, the theory was that this was a confession. that's what the prosecution was adopting as the notion to introduce this, that he was saying, right, on the video, "i did them so bad". so now you have to bring his son in to say no, he said "they did him so bad." did you hear him say that before? yes, i heard my dad say that before, trying to go to the notion that they, whoever they are, of course we know the theory of the defense is that there were multiple shooters,

that there were other people who meant him harm, him being paul, in addition to the mom. and so therefore, i think that's what they had to clarify. obviously, that wasn't enough. i think last thing, you know, anderson, i think it came down to the credibility and the lack of trust. i think this was a defendant who admitted what he had to admit and denied what he had to deny. and as we discussed before, when you go down an avenue, when you're creating a story and then all of the sudden videos pop up that suggest that you're there, that's something that you just cannot overcome, particularly when you say and admit you lied to everyone in your life. why would you not be lying to that jury? >> let's play that video again, just the sound of alex murdaugh in the police vehicles and what he actually said. >> when paul's phone came out, did you just pick it up and put it on, place it back down on him? >> you know, yeah, i did not try

to open it or anything, you know. i just -- i don't know how i had in my mind that i needed to not mess anything up. i had that, you know -- somehow i had that presence of mind that i needed to not mess anything up. and so i tried not to. >> and you definitely saw a traumatic picture, and i know it's not easy. i know it's hard. and sitting there talking today is tough. >> it's just so bad. i did him so bad.

>> so that was the key moment. mark o'mara, how important -- i don't know if we will ever get an answer from the jury about whether they thought of that moment. but how important was that piece of video, you think? >> i will tell you the truth. i thought that was a weak moment for state to try and present that as a confession. now a freudian slip confession possibly, but i don't think they should have really focused on that as being some massive confession of him, because quite honestly, there is a couple of interpretations of it. and with the special evidence case, you to be a little careful with the jury going beyond the permission they give you. they put together a very good case. i didn't think that was particularly compelling. i thought i heard the word "i" rather than "they."" but i don't think it really mattered too much. i think they needed to put together a case they did. >> i want to bring in the jury consultant jill huntley taylor. jill, it's so fascinating to see these videos now of alex

murdaugh breaking down, whether it's in that police vehicle, breaking down the night of the killings, breaking down on the stand with the realization certainly that the jury believes he was lying all along and did in fact murdered these people, his wife and his son. talk a little bit about just as somebody who is a jury consultant, about this, the deliberations they took. were you surprised by the speed of this? >> in hindsight, no, now that we know what the verdict is, the three hours, they must have all agreed. they must not have had any doubt. you know, i think all of the testimony that they saw, all the science, the technology, the emotion was a lot for them to have to deal with. and so i think we all going into their deliberations expected that 100 witnesses in all of this testimony, there would be a lot for them to pore over. but at the end of the day, they must have all really been on the same page going right from the

start. that's why their deliberations were pretty quick. >> it is extraordinary the career this man has had. this is the oldest of old boy networks in this part of south carolina. his great grandfather was the prosecutor. his grandfather was the prosecutor. his father was the prosecutor. it is an extraordinary, you know -- i mean, god knows what they were doing over the last 100 years when they were the power in this community, but we see what he has done with the limited power that he had. he was defrauding people right and left. >> well, it seems that the line ends with him. but one of the things that i thought was so extraordinary about this trial throughout were sort of the personal references from the lawyers, for example, to the defendant's father and grandfather, when the defendant's son buster was on the stand, the prosecutor who was questioning him in cross-examination expressed sorrow for buster's losses and

mentioned buster's grandfather, i believe, and how the prosecutor had worked under him in the solicitor's office and he was very good to me. there were a number of references to family members throughout the trial. and i thought that was just a fascinating layer of this. it showed sort of the local sort of aspect of this and how important this family had been ingrained in law enforcement for so many generations. >> john, somebody who has been involved in investigations, it's -- when you see the series of events that took place before these killings of from his son paul crashing a boat in which somebody was killed, and then there was questions about who was actually driving the boat, was it paul, was it somebody else, did law enforcement protect paul in a way, did they not do a job of actually ascertaining who was driving? a dead body of a young gay man in the road, perhaps some connection to the murdaugh family. >> the housekeeper down the stairs. >> the money being stolen from

the insurance. i mean, what you get here -- >> him allegedly paying somebody to shoot him in the head who turned out to be a distant cousin. and it wasn't as presented. >> exactly. first he tried to fake his own murder. but i mean, you see that, that there is this pattern of, you know, getting away with murder, which, you know, didn't include getting away with this murder. and i think one of the differences is you may have all that influence, you may have all those friends, you may have the family connections and the money, but as a great supreme court justice said a long time ago, the best antiseptic is a bright and shining light. and there was a lot of attention on this case there was no getting away with this murder. >> yeah. we're going take a short break. our coverage continues in just a moment.

moderate to severe eczema still disrupts my skin. despite treatment it disrupts my skin with itch. it disrupts my skin withash. but now, i can disrupt ecza with rinvoq. rinvoq is noa steroid, topical, or injection. it's one pill, once a day. many taking rinvoq saw clear or almost-clear skin while some saw up to 100% clear skin. and, they felt dramatic and fast itch relief some as early as 2 days. that's rinvoq relief. rinvoq can lower your ability to fight infections, including tb. serious infections and blood clots, some fatal, cancers including lymphoma and skin cancer, death, heart attack, stroke, and tears in the stomach or intestines occurred. people 50 and older with at least one heart disease risk factor have higher risks. don't take if allergic to rinvoq, as serious reactions can occur.

tell your doctor if you are or may become pregnant. disrupt the itch and rash of eczema. talk to your doctor about rinvoq. learn how abbvie can help you save. ♪

experience the capability of the complete line of suvs at the invitation to lexus sales event. no, it's literally never crossed my mind. what if we live to like 100? that's 35 years of being retired. i don't want to outlive our money. and i have been eating all these stupid chia seeds! i could totally live to be 100! why do i keep taking such good care of my- since we started working with empower, we're able to get all our financial questions answered,

so we don't have to worry. so you never- no. never. join 17 million people and take control of your financial future to empower what's next. start today at empower.com the stunning breaking news tonight, alex murdaugh, whose defense was that he is a liar but not a murderer has been convicted of murdering his wife and son. jurors not buying it, reaching a remarkably speedy verdict in just three hours after a trial that saw the prosecution recreate the crime step by terrible step. take a look. >> now, is this the door the same as the feed room door? >> it's a couple inches wider than the feed room door. >> and of course the feed room dur is inset, correct? >> that is correct. >> so this is not exactly a replication of what happened at the feed room door. >> no, sir, it's not. the door swings the same direction, though. >> now you have given me

permission -- i'm very careful about muzzle awareness. but you have given me permission to point this at you, correct? >> i have. >> you actually asked me to, correct? >> yes, sir, i did. >> so go in there and stand a couple of feet back. it doesn't have to be five feet. but you have since testified that paul was five feet inside the feed room, correct? >> can we demonstrate the first shot out here? >> stand back a little bit, because you have to stumble toward me. >> yes, sir. >> i'm going to point like i'm pointing at you. paul is shot. where is the shooter approximately outside the door? >> the breach phase of ejection bore is shot just past the door frame. >> okay. paul has just been shot. >> yes, sir. >> and in the defense's theory, you tell me what to do, and you act this out. and i'm going to tell you what you tell me to do, based on the defense's theory of the case. >> the defense agreed with the assessment that paul stood there for a moment bleeding down his injured left arm, and he slowly

walked toward the door. >> okay. and what does the shooter do? >> the shooter is coming in the door. >> and then what does the shooter do? >> he shoots paul in the back of the head after he passes him. >> okay. and then shoots paul in the back of the head like this. and where does the blood spatter go? >> the blood spatter, the pellet defects, and one that i didn't know about that the expert collected was in the door frame at the top of the door. >> now i understand this is a little different than the feed room door. that's the best we can do. so what did you find odd about the theory, first of all? >> i think the theory is preposterous in my opinion. >> mark o'mara, that is probably among the most effective parts of the prosecution's presentation, wasn't it? >> well, it really is for a number of reasons. don't forget we as people, certainly jurors, we learn by

seeing. you know, by hearing is okay. but you listen to it, you might get most of it. but when you see it, and you really understand it, that's what you remember constantly. and that's what the jury remembers when they were seeing it and when they went back to their jury room to talk about it. so i love and i like using demonstrative tools in a courtroom because we learn by seeing. and i thought that was very, very effective. and then as testimony after it supports the visualization. >> how effective do you think that was? >> so it's important because remember what was happening here. what was happening. that was an expert by the way from the prosecution who was doing that. it's demonstrative. >> and it came after a defense crime scene expert? >> exactly. remember what they were talking about, which is that it was a 5'2". it would have to be someone who was a lot shorter. and remember, the prosecutor was mocking that, talking about a 12-year-old. >> the defense expert said there is no way a 6'4" person, which is alex murdaugh, would have been able to fire from that

angle the gun that was used. >> correct. they would have had to have it -- it would be overly low. it would be unsustainable, and it couldn't happen. so at issue was whether or not, of course, the defense was trying to exclude the notion that a person of the height of alex murdaugh would have committed this crime. and then of course this was the comeback. and the comeback of the prosecution was nonsense. and essentially, that expert pretty much said it's preposterous what they're suggesting, they being the defense, that it would be this 5'2" person. too many variables. i thought absolutely that was effective at demonstrating to the jury that the notion that the defense had with respect to the height of the shooter was just nonsensical. >> i agree. i think that was a measurement where the defense just lost a lot of credibility because their forensic theory of why it would have been a shooter of a different height or two shooters really sort of went down the drain at that point. you heard the witness say it was a preposterous theory, and they showed how it was preposterous by reenacting it. and it involved the shooter sort

of pushing past paul as the victim into this narrow doorway to go behind him and then shoot him from inside this narrow space, which really made no sense. and he just explained then after the demonstration in words why it was preposterous. so i thought that was a really important moment. >> john, you were saying during the break the expectations that we've all watched csi. we see, you know, a crime in a big city and how many cameras there are. talk about that a little bit. >> i mean, i think jurors, even in the place like north carolina where they are watching, you know, these stories are used to these seamless cases where you have the videocam that's done after the fact, and you have the defendant leaving his house, and you see him getting into the car, and then they present the license plate reader evidence that tracks the car everywhere along the i welcome back, and then you see the video of them getting out and you see the cell phone tracking. these cases really can be seamless in an environment of a

1700 acre farm that doesn't have security cameras everywhere, where the cell phone evidence was presented, but it was confusing and spotty, you've got a really circumstantial case. i think the defense struggled. i mean, that last scene we just looked at where they're taking apart the defense's kind of tortured theory by demonstrating it looks almost impossible if you try to reenact it that way is on top of the idea that both guns came from the property. why would the killers not bring their own guns? why would the killers have the ability to know that the mom and the sun would be at that spot at that time? how would they know that? if the idea was that the killers showed up because they knew they could access weapons from the property because those weapons wouldn't be traced to them, why were the weapons missing after the fact if you didn't want them traced to you. there was just so much in terms of the pile on things that one

fact might have been an explanation to fill a gap. but together, they couldn't harmonize them to make sense. >> including shell casings. >> from the weapons that were found on the property. >> not from this shooting. from prior shootings. >> jill huntley, as a jury consultant, what's so fascinating is there were two weapons. the defense was saying, well, that's evidence of two shooters. what it may be evidence of, if the jury is correct and alex murdaugh is now has been convicted of killing his wife and son, is that this was thought out and perhaps intentional that he was using -- it was staged. he was intentionally using. >> two shooters. >> and it does seem -- jill, i just want to ask you, as a jury consultant, how do demonstrations like that -- in your experience, are they particularly effective on juries? >> absolutely. i completely agree, the jurors need visuals toe act something

out, especially with a witness like this who was a very credible witness who definitely connected and made common sense, made a common sense presentation to the jury. and then the jury goes to moselle. and even the defense asked for that, the jury now can specifically visualize where this took place. i thought that was an interesting strategy. >> the premeditation, john, of this now is so fascinating. now that we have this conviction, you look back at all the steps that alex murdaugh took, calling his friends to say oh, i've invited -- i'm going down to see my family, to call up his friends. he tried to call one friend to tell him he was going to go visit his mom. he called other people to try to basically lay out alibis all along the way. >> very much like we just discussed with the two guns, you know. let me make it look like it appear it's two people. yet look at the two elements. that his own son, the murder

victim, may have inadvertently solved the case with that piece of video. and his wife, who, you know, they were in the throes of having a very difficult time. the son had found the pills in the computer bag, and his $60,000 a week oxy habit. the wife was saying this was a betrayal. there were financial people closing in on these other frauds where if she went south from him, that was going to be a problem. and i mean, she texted, she messages somebody as she's going to the farm. well, we'll all drive simply. no, let's drive together. you come here. he is setting this up. and she messages somebody and says i'm going to the farm to meet him there. it seems fishy. >> her sister, right. >> who actually testifies and her sister feels incredibly guilty on the stand saying she actually encouraged her sister to go that night to see her

husband. >> but you can see the elements of him building a story line ahead of time, setting up the movement. >> even going to visit his mother, establishing an alibi, a mother who has alzheimer's and is not going to be testifying guest him there was a nurse present who did testify. >> yeah, i think the defendant in some ways made himself more vulnerable to this -- the prosecution theory that he was staging an alibi, when from the beginning, when he is interviewed by investigators the night of the murders, check my phone, check my phone that will tell you the times of things. he was urging them to look for the digital trail. it just made it clear he was thinking about his digital footprint from the beginning. >> randi, i want to bring you in. you have been following this from the beginning. we've been showing video from the night of the killings when law enforcement arrives on the scene, and you see -- we're showing them again. you see alex murdaugh wandering around. this moment is incredibly important in terms of what he says, do you think? >> absolutely, because not only

what he says, anderson, first of all he talks about when he saw his family last, which now we know is a lie. but it's what he is wearing that is really critical. he is in a white t-shirt and shorts, khaki shorts in that video. and that's at 10:06 p.m., after he calls 911. earlier in the night at 7:56 p.m., his son paul again providing evidence. there is a snapchat video that he sent to friends. it shows alex murdaugh at a tree. they were having some tree problems. the tree was falling over. and you hear paul murdaugh on the other end laughing. and you see alex murdaugh, and he is wearing long pants and a blue short-sleeved shirt. very different than what he was wearing just a couple hours later. so he was asked many, many times, anderson, when did he change? >> and that clothing hasn't been found, is that correct? >> exactly. they've never found. and that was part of what the defense went after the prosecution for. they never did test that

clothing. they never found that clothing. so how do they know if there is blood on it or gunshot residue. but they never found the khaki pants, they never found the blue shirt and the murder weapons. those two shotguns, the shotgun and the 300 blackout rifle have also been missing. it's the key. that clothing change was a big thing for the jury. you could watch them reacting when they were talking about it. and help was trying to make excuses for when he decided to change or shower. >> i can't recall. did alex murdaugh have an explanation, or did the defense have an explanation for the disappearance of those clothes? >> no. well, the defense tried to say how do you know they're missing? he left moselle that night, the property where this happened. that's what it's called. he left and he went to his mother's house. did you see what he took to his mother's house? they were asking this of the house keeper? she was the one who said i never saw those clothes again. so they were trying to say he never spent another night atmos sele. so you don't know what he took when he left. >> interesting. we're going take another short break with more breaking news

coverage of the guilty verdict in the alex murdaugh murder trial. ♪ inner voice (kombucha brewer): if i just stare at these payroll forms... my business' payroll taxes will calculate themselves. right? uhh...nope. intuit quickbooks helps you manageour payroll taxes, cheers! with 100% accurate tax calculations guaranteed. this is how tosin lost 33 lbs on noom weight. i'm tosin. noom gave her a psychological approach to weight loss. noom has taught me how you think about food has such a huge impact on your relationship with it. (chuckle) lose weight and make it last with noom weight.

♪

my relationship with my credit cards wasn't good. i got into debt in college and, no matter how much i paid, it followed me everywhere. between the high interest, the fees... i felt trapped. debt, debt, debt. so i broke up with my credit card debt and consolidated it into a low-rate personal loan from sofi. i finally feel like a grown-up. break up with bad credit card debt. get a personal loan with no fees, low fixed rates, and borrow up to $100k. go to sofi.com to view your rate. sofi. get your money right. ♪

the breaking news at this hour, alex murdaugh convicted on four charges including two counts of murdering his wife and sign point blank. another key moment from the trial, his brother, john marvin murdaugh, testifying about cleaning up the crime scene. >> it had not been cleaned up. i saw blood, i saw brains, i saw pieces of skull. when i say brains, it could be just tissue, i don't know what it was, it was just terrible. and for some reason, i thought it was mine -- something that i needed to do for paul to clean it up. i felt like i owed him. and i started cleaning. and i -- promise you, no mother or father, aunt or uncle, should ever have to see and do what i did that day. >> and here with our legal team, jury consultant joe huntley taylor.

let me ask you, that's obviously a very emotional moment, and clearly the defense wanted it to be an emotional moment on the jury. fascinating now to look at it, look at alex murdaugh crying there, or mimicking crying there. it clearly did not have that big an impact on the jury. i mean, a sad moment, but it didn't show or at least we haven't talked to the jury, but it didn't seem to show what the defense wanted it to, besides the emotion of it, which was that the investigators had had a sloppy crime scene. >> right, right. there was a lot of emotion in this trial, right? you know, the family members, buster, we showed that earlier. and alex cried a lot. but you can cry for a lot of reasons. and i guess the jurors could see that as well. you can cry because you're guilty, you can cry because this is awful what you're going through. you know, it's not just -- they didn't see it as a crying

because he lost his wife and son. they obviously didn't see it that way. >> john, you've been on a lot of the crime scenes. i don't know why i harp on this. the police don't clean up crime scenes. family cleans up -- families mop up the blood of their loved ones all the time. >> i mean, the building, the -- there are companies, literally companies you can hire that do crime scene cleanup. but, you know, families do it. it's the police, you know -- they collect the evidence. what they leave behind, they leave behind. but it's a bigger picture. >> what the defense was attempting to establish is that's one more thing that sled did inappropriately. what are they talking about? the lack of getting any type of prints at all. the lack of looking and investigating any tire tracks. the lack of doing anything that would suggest it was anyone other than alex murdaugh who had committed this crime. i think they were trying to establish, it wasn't even that,

hey, we had an obligation to clean up the crime scene. they had an obligation to do their job at the crime scene, which was to determine whether there was any other evidence which would be suggestive of anyone else having committed this offense, and that's the point the defense was attempting to make. apparently the jury didn't buy it. >> the police did put out a statement soon after this saying, the community shouldn't be concerned? >> i thought that was one of the pieces of evidence and lines of argument that i thought might get more traction. that the defense had advanced. they had the police put out this press release the morning after the murders telling the public -- >> the defense alleging the police were narrowly focused on alex murdaugh unfairly from the get-go? >> yes, they thought it demonstrated the police had narrowed their focus and were not going to follow up on any other leads. reinforcing what joey said, that this was, they argued, a sloppy, lazy investigation. >> stay with us, much more ahead on the alex murdaugh guilty verdict. a jury convicting him of killing his wife and youngest son.

an extraordinary day in court. some three hours they've deliberated. "360'" randi kaye shows us how we got to this pointnt, next. ♪ i gotta good feeling about this, yeah ♪ ♪ i'm with it ♪ ♪ i gotta good feeling about this ♪ ♪ yeah, ♪ ♪ so let's get it ♪ ♪ i'm feeling good vibes ♪

as the world keeps changing, so does covid-19. how recent is your booster? there are updated boosters designed to better protect against recent omicron variants. schedule yours now. ♪ when aspen dental told me that my dentures were ready, i was so excited. i love the confidence. i love that i can blast this beautiful smile and make the world smile with me. i would totally say aspen dental changed my life. aspen dental makes new smiles affordable. right now, get 20% off dentures.

we do anything to make you smile.

it has been a stunning night of criminal justice in america in a murder trial that drew national attention for the