Joshua Boucher/The State/Tribune News Service via Getty
The South Carolina judge who sentenced Alex Murdaugh life in prison without the possibility of parole for slaying his wife and son acknowledged Wednesday that he felt bad for the former lawyer. “I felt sorry for him,” Circuit Court Judge Clifton Newman told Today. “I felt that he was just in a position where he could not, where if there’s a hole that he could go into, he would dive in that hole and keep going to the lowest depths.” The shocking admission comes several months after Newman presided over Murdaugh’s case, where he was convicted of murdering Maggie and Paul Murdaugh in June 2021. Speaking alongside one of his daughters, who is also a judge, Newman said he believed that if Murdaugh “had an opportunity to do it over again, he'd never do it.” “I cannot imagine him having a peaceful night, knowing what he did,” he added. Murdaugh faces about 100 other state charges, and several federal charges, ranging from money laundering to insurance fraud and drug trafficking.
In a TODAY exclusive, Judge Clifton Newman sits down with @craigmelvin in his first television interview since the verdict in the high-profile Alex Murdaugh trial and says he “shouldn’t’ have been surprised” by the spotlight that was put on him during the trial. pic.twitter.com/ZcqfqdkIXA
