The Netflix true crime documentary Murdaugh Murders: A Souther Scandal examines the Murdaugh legal dynasty and the numerous criminal incidents they have been involved in, including the homicide of Maggie and Paul Murdaugh in June 2021.
The mother and son were shot dead by Alex Murdaugh, the family’s patriarch, allegedly so he could divert attention from a slew of financial crimes that were about to become public at the time. In the years since, Alex was sentenced to two life sentences in prison for the murder, despite maintaining his plea of not guilty, and pleaded guilty to “22 counts of financial fraud and money laundering,” AP reports. Through the scandals, there has been one family member who has emerged largely untouched.
Buster Murdaugh, Maggie and Alex’s oldest son, and Paul’s older brother, was 200 miles away from the scene of his family members’ murder but is still convinced his father did not have it in him to carry out such appalling crimes.
Where is Buster Murdaugh in 2023?
As of Nov. 2022, Buster Murdaugh was living in a Hilton Head Island one-bedroom condominium with his girlfriend Brooklynn White, according to Fox News. The two have been together for at least two years, with Buster testifying to being in White’s Rock Hill home at the time of the murders.
As was family tradition, Murdaugh was studying law in 2019 at the University of South Carolina, before being expelled for plagiarism. He was never readmitted to the college, despite his father’s best attempts at hiring the most expensive of lawyers to plead his case, reportedly paying up to $60,000. White also attended the same law school around the same time, so it is likely the two met sometime between 2018 and 2019. She now works at Olivetti McCray & Withrow as an attorney focusing on estate planning, probate, and trust administration.
As of Sept. 2022, the family’s attorney Jim Griffin told The Post and Courier that Buster had put “his desire to go to law school on hold” for the time being, and was not planning to go back in “fall or spring”. There are no reports about what Murdaugh is doing as of Sept. 2023, but he finally spoke publicly about the case in Fox Nation’s The Fall of The House of Murdaugh three-part documentary, which aired Aug. 31.
Buster Murdaugh maintains his father’s innocence, but believes he could be a ‘psychopath’
Buster Murdaugh made some damning revelations to Fox Nation during the channel’s 2023 documentary about the Murdaugh family, where he called his father Alex a “thief,” “liar” and “manipulator.” However, the family’s firstborn still does not believe his dad could have killed his mother and brother.
“I don’t think that he could be affiliated with endangering my mother and brother,” Buster told Fox Nation, adding “I hold a very unique perspective that nobody else in that courtroom ever held. And I know the love that I have witnessed.” It’s that same perspective that informs his opinion that his father’s was not a fair trial and that the jury was swayed by things they had read about him in the media before reaching a verdict.
“I think it was a tilted table from the beginning. A lot of the jurors felt that way prior to when they had to deliberate. It was predetermined in their minds prior to when they ever heard any shred of evidence that was given in that room.”
While not a murderer, Buster knows his father is not an honest person, especially after pleading guilty to a number of financial crimes. Based on “the manipulation and the lies,” Buster said it’s fair to assert that Alex has psychopathic characteristics. When asked whether he was similar to his dad, the 29-year-old said “I am not a thief, I am not a liar, I am not a manipulator. In those regards, I am nothing like him.”
To add to the case’s eerie nature, Alex also admitted to trying to have his cousin Curtis Smith fatally shoot him a few months after the deaths of Maggie and Paul, so his son Buster could keep $10 million of life insurance money. The bullet only grazed Alex, and Curtis was arrested and charged with “assisted suicide,” and “conspiracy to commit insurance fraud,” among others.
What murder case is Buster Murdaugh connected with?
The Murdaugh family members have shined a new light on another strange death that occurred near their Moselle estate in 2015. Initially ruled a hit-and-run by an autopsy done at the time, Stephen Smith’s death is now being investigated as a murder. Per The Mirror, State Law Enforcement Division Chief Mark Keel says state agents, who took over the case in 2021, believe it was “a murder” and “not a hit-and-run.”
With Buster and Stephen attending the same high school and allegedly being romantically involved, rumors spread about the one seemingly innocent member of the Murdaugh family possibly having a few skeletons of his own. Smith family lawyer Ronnie Richter clarified that there’s “no evidence” connecting the two men together. Buster told Fox Nation the same thing.
“I never had anything to do with his murder, and I never had anything to do with him on a physical level, of any regard.”
The Murdaugh family is knee-deep in controversy. Alex Murdaugh might be behind bars for the rest of his life, but there’s no telling what other bloody secrets might surface in the future.