DOJ Asks Court To Deny Alex Murdaugh’s Appeal For Financial Crimes Sentence

Prosecutors with the Department of Justice have asked the court to deny convicted murderer Alex Murdaugh’s appeal of his sentence for financial crimes.

Federal prosecutors argued that part of Murdaugh’s plea deal included a stipulation that he sign away his right to appeal the sentence, Fox News reported. Murdaugh pled guilty in September 2023 to 22 counts of fraud and other financial crimes after reaching a plea agreement with federal prosecutors.

“For more than 15 years, he spun a complex web of exploitation, manipulation and deceit, preying on highly vulnerable victims in pursuit of his own financial gain,” federal prosecutors wrote in a motion filed in federal court last week, according to Fox.

Murdaugh’s attorneys and federal prosecutors had asked U.S. District Judge Richard Gergel for a 30-year sentence to run concurrently with Murdaugh’s 27-year sentence for state financial crime and consecutive life sentences for the murders of his wife Maggie, and youngest son, Paul.

Instead, Gergel sentenced Murdaugh to 40 years in prison for the federal financial crimes, which Murdaugh’s attorneys have called cruel and unusual punishment. In appealing the sentence, Murdaugh’s attorneys argued that the 40-year sentence is effectively a life sentence, given Murdaugh’s age, WCSC reported. Murdaugh, who is 55, is required to serve at least 85% of his sentence, which amounts to 34 years. However, the life expectancy of a 55-year-old man is only another 24 years, according to the Social Security Administration.

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Murdaugh’s appeal said the state guidelines should have sentenced him between 17 and 22 years for the crimes and cites three similar cases with median sentences of 17.5 years.

Judge Gergel sentenced Murdaugh to the longer term, stating in his ruling that Murdaugh stole money from “the most needy, vulnerable people.” This included a client who was left without the use of his arms or legs after a crash and a trust fund for children whose parents had been killed in a car crash.

Murdaugh pleaded guilty to stealing millions of dollars from his previous law firm and its clients and, in addition to prison time, was ordered to pay more than $8 million in restitution to his victims.