Elizabeth” Libby” Murdaugh, the oldest queen of the Murdaugh community and the family of disgraced former prosecutor and convicted criminal Alex Murdaugh, has died.
She “passed ahead happily Tuesday afternoon, March 19, 2024, at her house under hospice care. Plans are incomplete at this time, but will be announced quickly”, according to an , news by the Peeples- Rhoden Funeral Home , in Hampton. Her time was no listed.
Elizabeth Murdaugh was the wife of the later Randolph” Beautiful” Murdaugh III, who was the third and last in a series of Murdaughs to be lawyer, or the elected attorney, of the 14th Judicial Circuit, a home line that stretched roughly 90 times. He served from 1986 to 2005.
Elizabeth and Randolph Murdaugh III were married for 60 times. He died in 2021, only days after Paul and Maggie Murdaugh — his nephew and child- in- law — were murdered. A jury convicted Alex of those deaths.
Elizabeth Murdaugh was a lifelong public school teacher, an honors student of Columbia College and a part of the Hampton County school table, columnist- author Michael DeWitt wrote in his book,” Fall of the House of Murdaugh”.
Apologies posted on the funeral home’s web site included,” She was a wonderful man, with a style and good spirit. She taught my late girl, Belinda, in the fifth grade – again in 1965, and actually made a positive effect on Belinda’s life. It was my real pleasure to know Miss Libby”.
In 1976, Elizabeth Murdaugh and The State newspapers were the content of a fake when a false article for her was telephoned in to The State. The article, which was published by The State, said she was the woman of 14th Judicial Circuit Solicitor Randolph Murdaugh III and a political and church head. The State published a contraction the following morning. The culprit was not found.
The Murdaugh people, DeWitt wrote in his book, “avoided public controversy that dogged their men, who practiced laws, played politics, drank whiskey, joined hunting venues, made front page news and appreciated an enhanced position”.
Her survivors include sons Randolph” Randy” Murdaugh IV, a lawyer in the firm founded by his great grandfather and now known as Parker Law Group, John Marvin Murdaugh, a farm equipment dealer, and Alex, and a daughter, Lynn Murdaugh Goettee.
Her son Alex, a disbarred lawyer and former member of the family law firm, is now serving two life sentences in the S. C. Department of Corrections for the murders of his wife, Maggie, and son, Paul, at their family estate in 2021.
In Alex Murdaugh’s 2023 murder trial, defense testimony was used to support Alex’s alibi that he was visiting his ailing mother at her house, some miles from where Maggie and Paul were murdered. Although ample evidence showed Alex visited his mother’s house that night, the jury chose to believe the prosecutors ‘ version of events, in which they asserted Alex both visited his mother’s house and killed his wife and son in the space of about an hour.
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