Bland said he was not surprised by the decision given the extensive arguments devoted to Hill’s conduct during the trial during the hearings before Judge Toal and the Supreme Court. But he was surprised that the court went so far to say Hill “placed her fingers on the scales of justice,” explaining that the six jurors he represented, as well as five others, indicated in assorted testimony and interviews that Hill’s commentary, real or supposed, had “no effect on their verdicts.”
Bland noted that the court also offered some criticism of the trial judge, the now-retired Clifton Newman, and his decision to allow substantial amounts of testimony regarding Murdaugh’s financial crimes during the murder trial.
Normally evidence of other, unrelated and previous crimes is not allowed to be introduced in court, for fear of prejudicing a jury against a defendant. But in Murdaugh’s case, prosecutors convinced Newman that Murdaugh murdered his wife and son to distract from his many other misdeeds, therefore making the financial crimes relevant and worthy of exploration.
The court said Newman’s decision was not incorrect, per se, but was overly broad and permissive. For example, the state Supreme Court’s decision referenced testimony in which one witnesses discussed, at the prosecutor’s repeated urging, the disabled status of his brother, who was a financial victim of Murdaugh’s.
The court stopped short of declaring Newman’s decision a reason for retrial, however, sidestepping that issue by declaring it moot in light of Hill’s decidedly inappropriate actions. They cautioned that a new trial judge should think long and hard before allowing a similar volume of testimony concerning Murdaugh’s nonviolent crimes.
This part of the ruling led Murdaugh’s lawyers to anticipate that a retrial, wherever and whenever it might occur, would not simply be a pantomime of what was argued previously.
“We respect the decision that made clear that the retrial must look very different from the first. The initial jury heard more than twelve hours of testimony about Alex’s financial crimes. The Court held that this evidence went far beyond what was necessary and gave rise to unfair prejudice,” said Harpootlian and Griffin.
