Alex Murdaugh has officially filed for a new trial, eight months after he was found guilty of murdering his wife and son in 2021.
The petition was filed in Colleton County, South Carolina on Friday, multiple media outlets, including Fox Carolina and the Greenville News, reported.
The official filing comes about two months after Murdaugh’s legal team appealed the disgraced convictions of South Carolina attorneys. In March, Murdaugh (55) received two life sentences for the murders of his wife Maggie (52) and son Paul (22).
Everything you need to know about the Murdaugh murders, including Alex’s conviction
Alex Murdaugh is taken to Colleton County Court for sentencing on March 3, 2023 in Walterboro, South Carolina.
Joshua Boucher/The State/Tribune News Service via Getty
PEOPLE reviewed the motion filed by Murdaugh’s defense attorneys Richard Harpootlian and James Griffin in September, which accuses Colleton County Clerk of Court Rebecca Hill of tampering with the jury and “advising them to disbelieve Murdaugh’s testimony and other evidence presented by the defense. pressuring them for a quick conviction and even misrepresenting critical and material information to a judge in her campaign to remove a juror she believed to be sympathetic to the defense.”
According to the motion, Hill “pressured jurors to reach a quick verdict, telling them early in their deliberations that ‘it shouldn’t take long.’
“Ms. Hill did these things to secure book work and media appearances that would not have occurred in the event of a mistrial,” the motion said. “Ms. Hill betrayed her oath for money and fame.”
“The serious allegations in the petition filed today speak for themselves, but we believe they explain a number of peculiarities in the six-week trial,” Murdaugh’s lawyers said in a statement to PEOPLE at the time. “Alex Murdaugh maintained and still maintains that he is innocent of the murders of Maggie and Paul and believes that the truth will prevail in the end.”
Hill has denied allegations of jury tampering Hampton County Guardian in September.
The Murdaugh Murders: A Complete Timeline of the Alex Murdaugh Trial
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Alex Murdaugh.
Tracy Glantz/The State/Tribune News Service via Getty
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Post and Courier reported that Murdaugh’s attorneys filed another motion Wednesday to recuse Judge Clifton Newman from the case before he rules on the request for a new trial.
According to the Associated Press, Murdaugh’s lawyers argued that Newman was no longer impartial to the facts of the case because he implied in several interviews after the sentencing that Murdaugh was guilty. They also argued that Newman was a material witness to Hill’s alleged jury tampering.
“If the fact finder is the judge who convicted Mr. Murdaugh on national television, the decision to request a new trial will be irreversible and forever in doubt. The bell cannot be overturned in the appeal process,” the lawyers claim, per Post and Courier.
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