COLUMBIA, S.C. –. Output: COLUMBIA, S.C. –.

Over a year ago, his spouse and younger son were tragically shot outside their residence, and on Thursday, discredited South Carolina lawyer Alex Murdaugh was accused of committing murder in their killings.

Until now, he had not been charged in connection with the deaths of his wife and son, but Murdaugh is already jailed and facing numerous criminal charges that have accumulated in the months since Maggie, 52, and their 22-year-old son, Paul, were killed.

A bond hearing, which is yet to be scheduled, could potentially reveal additional information. Despite a thorough 13-month investigation, no information regarding the manner in which the police connected Murdaugh to the deaths has been disclosed. Authorities allege that Murdaugh used a rifle to kill his wife and a shotgun to kill his son. The indictments were issued by a grand jury in Colleton County, where the tragic shootings took place.

Upon arriving back at their property, Murdaugh, who is 54 years old, found his son and wife brutally murdered while he was visiting his sick father and mother. He has consistently maintained his innocence and denied any involvement in the homicides.

For nearly a century, the Murdaugh family has been the dominant force in the legal scene of the neighboring tiny town of Hampton, with prosecutors from the family being elected to the area’s highest positions. This tradition started with Murdaugh’s great-grandfather and grandfather, and continued with his father, who served as a prosecutor for a straight 87 years in Hampton.

Murdaugh, who once worked for the century-old family-founded law firm, discreetly boasted about securing million-dollar verdicts for accidental deaths in workplace safety or product liability cases, where he was known as a skilled money embezzler in September.

The family business decided to engage in theft of funds shortly after his remaining son became eligible to receive a $10 million life insurance policy, according to officials. Allegedly, he sought assistance from a friend to end his life, with the intention of deceiving the police by fabricating a story about being shot by an unknown individual while on the side of the road. As a result, multiple individuals who had employed him and discovered that he had embezzled $8.5 million initiated investigations, leading to charges. The June 2021 deaths prompted authorities to thoroughly examine all aspects of Murdaugh’s life.

The police state that although they initially reported what led them to review the death of Stephen Smith in a hit-and-run in Hampton County in July 2015, they also gathered additional information during their investigations into the Murdaugh case.

The funds for the wrongful-death lawsuits in Satterfield’s case, exceeding $4 million, were provided by Murdaugh’s home insurance providers, whom prosecutors alleged failed to allocate any portion of it to her family, despite Murdaugh’s assertion that he was negotiating on their behalf. The family asserted that Gloria Satterfield, the Murdaugh’s domestic worker, passed away in the hospital a few days after a fall in 2018, and law enforcement agents exhumed her remains.

In June, Murdaugh was indicted by prosecutors for attempting to help him commit suicide, charging his former client and friend who were also involved in the same painkiller ring and money laundering scheme for eight years.

In the previous month, the released indictments disclosed that Murdaugh penned 437 checks valued at $2.4 million. His companion cashed these checks during a span of eight years, retaining a portion of the funds for personal gain and utilizing the remainder for a range of unlawful pursuits.

Murdaugh has been incarcerated since October, detained on a $7 million bond.

On Tuesday, Murdaugh was disbarred by the South Carolina Supreme Court, affirming the unavoidable outcome following his attorneys’ decision not to challenge the arguments presented during a disbarment hearing in June.