Murdaugh Family's Moselle Estate

Author: Jewls Krueger

The Murdaugh family had been the most powerful legal dynasty in the South Carolina Lowcountry for nearly a century. For three generations, a Murdaugh had served as the chief prosecutor of the 14th Circuit, a swath of rural South Carolina that includes Hampton, Allendale, Colleton, Jasper, and Beaufort counties. The family name was so deeply embedded in the region's legal system that locals largely assumed the Murdaughs were untouchable — a belief that Alex Murdaugh himself had apparently come to share. By the time the full scope of his crimes came to light, investigators had connected him to financial fraud totaling more than $8 million stolen from clients and law partners, the suspicious deaths of at least three people in addition to his wife and son, and ultimately the murders he had committed on a warm June night on his own property.

Alex Murdaugh purchased the Moselle estate in 2012 from the wife of Barrett Boulware, a suspected drug smuggler and longtime Murdaugh family friend who died in 2018 — the same year Murdaugh is accused of stealing $750,000 in insurance money from Boulware while he was dying of colon cancer. The 5,275-square-foot main house on the property had been built by Boulware in 2011. Sitting on roughly 1,772 acres in Islandton, South Carolina, Moselle was the kind of property that announced power without saying a word — more than 2.5 miles of river frontage, vast stretches of swamp and forest, fields full of deer and turkey, and a cluster of dog kennels where the Murdaugh family kept their hunting dogs. Alex and his wife Maggie, and their two sons Buster and Paul, used it as a hunting retreat and weekend getaway. It was also where, on the evening of June 7, 2021, Alex Murdaugh murdered his wife and youngest son.

The Murders

Maggie Murdaugh, 52, and Paul Murdaugh, 22, were found shot to death near the dog kennels at approximately 10:06 p.m., when Alex called 911 to report finding their bodies. Alex told investigators he had been napping in the main house earlier that evening before driving to visit his ailing mother, and that he had not been at the kennels that night. That alibi began unraveling within 24 hours. A friend of Paul's named Rogan Gibson told investigators that Paul had called him that evening to talk through an issue with Gibson's dog, Cash, who was being kept at the kennels. During the call, Gibson said he was nearly certain he could hear Alex's voice in the background.

What investigators didn't know yet was that Paul had recorded a short video at 8:44 p.m. that night at the kennels — a clip of Cash's wagging tail. The video contained three distinct voices: Paul's, Maggie's, and Alex's, who could be heard calling out to another family dog named Bubba. Authorities believed Paul and Maggie were shot at approximately 8:49 p.m., when both of their phone screens went dark and were never opened again. It took investigators months to retrieve the video; Paul's phone was locked, and despite the urgency of the case, the six-digit passcode — 041499, Paul's birthday — took time to crack. When an investigator finally watched the clip, he put headphones on to make sure he was hearing what he thought he heard. "This," he later said, "just destroyed whatever alibi was put out there."

The physical evidence painted an equally damning picture. Maggie was shot four or five times with a 300 Blackout rifle, and Paul was shot twice at close range with a shotgun — two different weapons, suggesting a premeditated and methodical attack. Neither weapon was ever recovered. The guns used were consistent with firearms the Murdaugh family owned and kept on the property; a gun room inside the main house stored the family's large collection of hunting weapons and corresponding ammunition. The day after the murders, investigators used the Find My iPhone feature to locate Maggie's missing phone — it had been tossed along the side of a road not far from Moselle. GPS data from Alex's vehicle showed he had driven past the spot where the phone was found that night. Cell records also revealed that after leaving the property, Alex made ten calls to family and friends in roughly an hour, including five calls to Maggie's phone — the phone he had just thrown out his car window.

Prosecutors argued that Alex murdered his wife and son to generate sympathy and buy himself time before his years of financial crimes were discovered. He had been stealing from grieving clients — people whose cases his firm was handling — for years, funneling the money to fund a severe opioid addiction he had hidden from his family. By the summer of 2021, the walls were closing in. The murders, prosecutors said, were a desperate attempt at a reset.

Alex Murdaugh's Fate

Alex Murdaugh - Public Domain

Alex Murdaugh was indicted on two counts of murder in July 2022. His trial began January 25, 2023, at the Colleton County Courthouse in Walterboro and lasted six weeks. The jury convicted him on all four counts — two counts of murder and two counts of possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime — after less than three hours of deliberation. He was sentenced to two consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole.

On May 13, 2026, the South Carolina Supreme Court unanimously overturned Murdaugh's murder convictions and ordered a new trial, ruling that Colleton County Clerk of Court Becky Hill had improperly influenced the jury during the 2023 proceedings. Murdaugh remains in custody serving a 40-year federal sentence for financial crimes, and prosecutors have stated they intend to retry him on the murder charges.

Disturbing Facts:

• In the weeks before the murders, the boat crash that killed 19-year-old Mallory Beach had come back to haunt the Murdaugh family. Beach had been one of six passengers on a boat Paul was driving drunk in February 2019 when he crashed into a piling near Parris Island. Paul was under indictment for boating under the influence causing death at the time of his murder. A civil lawsuit stemming from the crash threatened to expose Alex's finances.
• Gloria Satterfield, the Murdaugh family housekeeper for more than 20 years, died in February 2018 after a "trip and fall accident" at the Murdaugh home — the same property where Maggie and Paul would be found dead three years later. South Carolina investigators opened a criminal investigation into her death in 2021. Alex Murdaugh later pleaded guilty to stealing more than $4 million in insurance settlements from her estate.
• In July 2015, 19-year-old Stephen Smith was found dead on a Hampton County road with injuries inconsistent with a hit and run, the official ruling. His vehicle was found three miles away. Investigators reopened the case in 2021 after information gathered during the Murdaugh investigation led them back to Smith's death. The case remains unsolved.
• A month after the murders, Alex Murdaugh staged his own shooting on the side of a road, allegedly asking an associate to shoot him in the head so that Buster, his surviving son, could collect a $10 million life insurance policy. He survived. He was subsequently charged with insurance fraud and assisted suicide in addition to the murder charges.
• On the stand, Alex Murdaugh admitted to lying to law enforcement about his presence at the kennels on the night of the murders — then attributed the lies to "paranoid thinking" caused by opioid addiction. He also admitted to stealing from his clients and his law firm. He denied killing his wife and son.
• During an interview with investigators captured on video and played at trial, Alex Murdaugh made a remark about Paul that became one of the most discussed moments of the proceedings: "It's just so bad. I did him so bad." The defense argued he said "they" — as in, the killers — not "I."
• A day before the verdict, jurors visited Moselle to see the property and the dog kennels firsthand. Prosecutors had opposed the visit, noting that the vegetation had grown significantly since the summer of 2021.
• In May 2025, the trial court clerk, Becky Hill, was arrested on felony misconduct charges, accused of influencing the jury during deliberations. The arrest has renewed efforts by Murdaugh's legal team to secure a new trial. This ultimately succeeded on May 13, 2026 when they were granted a new trial.

The Moselle Estate Today

The Moselle estate is located at 4740 Moselle Road in Islandton, Colleton County, South Carolina, roughly an hour from Hilton Head Island. The property was initially listed for $3.9 million following the murders and sold for $2.6 million in 2023, with proceeds directed toward settlements for victims of Murdaugh's financial fraud. The property has since changed hands again — the main house and surrounding 21 acres were sold at auction for $1 million — and the estate is now privately owned.

This is private property. Do not attempt to access the grounds, approach the house, or trespass on any portion of the estate. Stay on public roads at all times and be respectful of the surrounding rural community.