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Countless items belonging to Alex Murdaugh went up for auction on Thursday, weeks after he was charged with murdering his wife Maggie and son Paul.
Many of the items going under the hammer come from the South Carolina hunting lodge where Murdaugh committed the brutal murders in June 2021, and include boxes of spent shotgun shells and a hunting shirt marked with ‘Alex’ inside the collar.
Also up for auction is furniture from the house, decoy ducks, grisly lamps made from turtle shells, and even a smiling decorative skull.
The auction is being held by Liberty Auctions in Georgia, and bidders are required to be onsite at the auction house’s warehouse to participate. Bidding began at 4pm.
Murdaugh was given two consecutive life sentences for the murders after the month-long trial captured the nation’s attention.
A shirt bearing Alex Murdaugh’s name that is up for auction in Georgia on Thursday
Boxes of shotgun shells, bullets, and rifle clips up for auction from the Murdaugh estate
A large crowd of people bidding on items from the Murdaugh estate on Thursday afternoon
Alex Murdaugh (right) with his murdered wife and son, Maggie , 52, and Buster, 22, (center) along with his surviving son Buster
Scenes from inside the warehouse where the auction was held showed rows of possessions laid out across long tables, as prospective bidders sorted through the items that once filled the sprawling country home of the prominent southern family.
Also visible were long tables filled with deer antlers, mounted turtle shells, decorative plates, figurines from a Christmas nativity scene.
In addition to Murdaugh’s own camouflaged shirt, numerous pairs of hunting boots could be seen in the inventory, along with a hat bearing a South Carolina Highway Patrol baseball cap.
And on top of the boxes of shotgun shells, boxes of unused rifle bullets were up for auction, along with a hunting crossbow, rifle scopes, and what appeared to be a case for a rifle or shotgun.
The furniture up for auction consisted of a set of leather couches and armchairs, along with countless wooden tables, bureaus, bedframes, bookshelves, and lamps.
There were also various household appliances, cameras, thermoses, tools and toolboxes, a pair of salt and pepper shakers decorated with The Grinch, flashlights, and household decor.
Before the auction started, countless people could be seen sifting through the items that once filled the Murdaugh home.
A South Carolina Highway Patrol cap up for auction at the Murdaugh estate sale on Thursday
Lamps made out of turtle shells up for auction at the Murdaugh home sale on Thursday. They sold for $800
A magazine full of ammunition, a camera, and a box of shotgun shells up for auction
A hunting crossbow up for sale at the Murdaugh estate sale on Thursday afternoon
A wall of hunting trophies up for auction from the Murdaughs’ mansion
Hunting boots belonging to the Murdaugh family up for auction on Thursday afternoon
The auction comes almost a year after the 1,700-acre mansion where the Murdaughs lived – and were murdered – was listed for $3.9million.
Moselle is currently under auction for $3.7million, according to Fox News, and the new owner decided to clear out the house and put everything up for auction.
Liberty Auction owner Lori Mattingly told CNN the task of cleaning out the house was ‘just like any other job.’
‘Their things are not any better or nicer than any other things that we pick up from other people’s homes,’ Mattingly said.
‘We go into a lot of very nice expensive homes. And we’ve had much nicer things than theirs, but their things are nice.’
Crowds of people gathered to the auction
Decoy ducks up for auction at the Murdaugh estate on Thursday afternoon
What appears to be a shotgun or rifle case was one of the many items up for auction
Also up for auction from the Murdaugh estate on Thursday afternoon was a decorative skull
Bidders and auctioneers at the Murdaugh estate auction on Thursday afternoon
Crowds sift through piles of antlers up for sale on Thursday afternoon at the auction
A man examines a rack of rifle ammunition at the Murdaugh estate auction on Thursday
A money bag from one of the banks Murdaugh was known to pick up cash from
Murdaugh is currently housed in high-security Kirkland Correctional Institution, one of South Carolina’s most notorious prisons.
And while the disgraced former lawyer escaped the death penalty for the murder of his wife Maggie and son Paul, prosecutors recently revealed they are seeking a third life sentence conviction for financial crimes, which would mean Murdaugh will spend the rest of his life behind bars due to the state’s ‘three strikes’ law.
He is currently appealing his murder convictions, but the state is specifically seeking three additional convictions for breach of trust totaling $10,000 or more.
Three additional convictions on the breach of trust charges would result in a life sentence, removing his chance of parole.
Murdaugh’s trial lasted six weeks and included more than 75 witnesses, but culminated in a jury taking less than three hours to find the 54-year-old guilty of shooting his wife and son dead.
Prosecutors said Murdaugh killed the pair to divert attention from financial crimes that were about to be exposed, including the millions of dollars he embezzled from his law firm and its clients.
The lying patriarch took the stand himself to tearfully testify about his crippling opioid addiction and how his love for Maggie and Paul meant he could never harm them.
But jurors took just 45 minutes to decide the disgraced lawyer was guilty of annihilating his own family, earning him two consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole.
Bidders at the ready at the auction of the Murdaugh estate on Thursday afternoon
A man looks through a box of wine up for auction at the Murdaugh estate sale Thursday
Bidders sift through a table full of the Murdaughs’ possessions on Thursday afternoon
A prospective bidder looks through a table of Murdaugh family possessions on Thursday
A box of bullets up for auction at the Murdaugh estate sale in Georgia on Thursday
Murdaugh called 911 on the evening of June 7, 2021, saying he found his son and wife dead when he returned home from a one-hour visit with his mother, who has dementia.
Authorities said Paul was shot twice with a shotgun, each round loaded with different sized shot, while Maggie was struck with four or five bullets from a rifle.
A crime scene report suggested that both victims were shot in the head after initially being wounded near dog kennels on the Murdaughs’ sprawling rural property.
Prosecutors took more than a year to charge the disgraced lawyer with murder but decided not to pursue the death penalty. Murdaugh, who is also charged with about 100 counts of financial and other crimes, adamantly denied any involvement in the killings.
Murdaugh could have received as little as 30 years behind bars, but the judge gave him the maximum: two consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole.
After the trial, some jurors said that the key piece of evidence in finding the lawyer guilty was a video on his son Paul’s cellphone that was shot minutes before the killings at the kennels near where the bodies were found.
The voices of all three Murdaughs can be heard on the video, though Alex Murdaugh had insisted for 20 months that he hadn’t been at the kennels that night.
When he took the stand in his own defense, the first thing he did was admit he had lied to investigators about being at the kennels, saying he was paranoid of law enforcement because he was addicted to opioids and had pills in his pocket the night of the killings.
Leather furniture up for sale at the Murdaugh estate auction on Thursday afternoon
A pair of wooden chairs and a table-lamp up for auction from the Murdaugh estate
A trio of beds up for auction from the Murdaugh estate on Thursday afternoon
A number of beds that were up for auction from the Murdaugh estate sale on Thursday
Murdaugh’s testimony only cemented what they were already thinking — that he easily lied, and could turn on and off his tears at will, jurors said.
Attorney Dick Harpootlian filed Murdaugh’s appeal to the South Carolina Court of Appeals.
Prosecutors didn’t have the weapons used to kill the Murdaughs or other direct evidence like confessions or blood spatter.
But they had a mountain of circumstantial evidence, including the video putting Murdaugh at the scene of the killings five minutes before his wife and son stopped using their cellphones forever.
Through more than 75 witnesses and nearly 800 pieces of evidence, jurors heard about betrayed friends and clients, Murdaugh’s failed attempt to stage his own death in an insurance fraud scheme, a fatal boat crash in which his son was implicated, the housekeeper who died in a fall in the Murdaugh home and the grisly scene of the killings.
The now-disbarred attorney admitted stealing millions of dollars from the family firm and clients, saying he needed the money to fund his drug habit. Before he was charged with murder, Murdaugh was in jail awaiting trial on about 100 other charges ranging from insurance fraud to tax evasion.
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