Convicted murderer Alex Murdaugh completed his evaluation at a South Carolina state prison and is now in a maximum security facility, but authorities would not say which one.
According to a press release from the South Carolina Department of Corrections, Murdaugh, 54, “has been transferred to the statewide protective custody of a South Carolina maximum security prison.”
The decision to remand Murdaugh came Thursday after a recommendation from the Protective Custody Review Board. His case was evaluated at the Kirkland Correctional Institution in Columbia.
The disgraced lawyer will be kept away from the general population due to “validated protective concerns.” The four-member board considers safety, sanity and classification before making decisions.
The South Carolina Corrections Department, for their own safety, does not disclose the exact location of inmates remanded in custody. There are six maximum security prisons in the state.
Laughing Alex Murdaugh appears shaven-headed in a new prison mugshot days after pleading guilty to the murder of his wife and son. The new mugshot was supposed to replace a blurry photo taken on March 3 (right) when he was transferred to the Kirkland Reception and Evaluation Center
Murdaugh will be housed with 28 other inmates “in a single eight-by-ten cell containing a bed, toilet and sink.” His privileges will be no different from those of other prisoners, the SCDC said.
This comes after many expressed concern about Murdaugh’s potential influence over the judiciary as a result of years of operating within the state’s legal sphere.
Prosecutors said Murdaugh killed his wife, Maggie, and son, Paul, at their home in June 2021, shot them with two different guns, cleared the crime scene, and then drove to his ailing mother before calling 911 and saying he had recovered the bodies. had discovered.
After a six-week trial, Murdaugh was sentenced to two life terms. ‘I am innocent. I would never hurt my wife, Maggie. I would never hurt my son Paul,” he told Judge Clifton Newman after his sentencing.
South Carolina’s six maximum-security prisons are located in five counties, two in Richland, with Greenville, Lee, McCormick and Dorchester among the others, reports The state.
On the same day Murdaugh was sent to his new home, reports emerged suggesting law enforcement is eyeing two new potential suspects in the 2015 murder of 19-year-old Stephen Smith in Hampton County.
Smith had ties to the Murdaugh family, most notably eldest son Buster.
Local news website FitsNews has named the two people as Patrick Wilson and Shawn Connelly, both 25, citing South Carolina Law Enforcement Division sources.
DailyMail.com has reached out to the SLED for comment on the new revelations. Stephen Smith was found dead in the middle of a two-lane highway in Hampton County on July 8, 2015. His car with the fuel cap removed and his wallet still inside was found a short distance away.
Kirkland Correctional Center will be Murdaugh’s grim new home for the next few weeks as he is assessed where he should be sent permanently
This undated file photo, provided July 11, 2019, by the South Carolina Department of Corrections, shows the new death row at Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia, SC
Kirkland, where Murdaugh was evaluated, is one of South Carolina’s most notorious facilities. Far from being safe within the prison’s fortified walls, inmates like Murdaugh face constant threats from the murderers, sex offenders, and armed robbers they call neighbors.
The shocking absence of law and order within the so-called penitentiary was highlighted in 2017 when two inmates strangled four others after luring victims into their cells with promises of drugs and biscuits.
The murders were committed by Denver Simmons, imprisoned for killing a mother and her son, and fellow inmate Jacob Philip, convicted of strangling his girlfriend and her eight-year-old daughter.
Their motive: the pair wanted to be put on death row because they were tired of life in hellhole prison.
One by one, they lured their four victims into their cells, then used a broom and an electrical cord as weapons to beat and strangle them, hiding the bodies behind a curtain on their bunk. Simmons and Philip then quietly walked to the sentry and confessed.
Kirkland inmates have also been known to orchestrate heinous crimes on the outside from their cells.
Two years ago, armed robber Harvester Jackson used a smuggled cell phone to orchestrate the attempted murder of his ex-girlfriend in Columbia, South Carolina.
Jackson was serving a 10-year sentence in Kirkland when he ordered four accomplices to shoot down the victim’s home, prosecutors alleged. His ex-girlfriend, who survived the attempt on her life, told investigators it wasn’t the first time Jackson had ordered an attack from behind bars.
Kirkland’s infamous reputation was also highlighted by a recent report that found it had the highest death rate of any prison in South Carolina. Between 2015 and 2021, 160 prisoners died in the state institution.
In second place was the Broad River Correctional Institution, which is just a stone’s throw from Kirkland and where Murdaugh could end up. There were 101 deaths at Broad River, which houses medium- and high-security inmates, over the six-year period.
Kirkland is where the vast majority of South Carolina’s male prisoners are first sent after being sentenced