announced that they had done so to the clerk. and now they are just waiting for court personnel to return to the courtroom, in which the jury will announce its verdict. they went in to deliberations at 3:50 eastern time this afternoon, so this seems like a relatively quick verdict for what was a very complicated and lengthy trial. prosecutors trying to prove that alec murdaugh killed his wife and son. they say to create a distraction as his admitted financial crimes were beginning to catch up with him. the murders took place on the same day that people from his law firm approached him and started questioning him about large sums of missing funds. alec murdaugh eventually admitted to stealing money from clients, from other attorneys, vulnerable individuals, some of his closest friends but throughout the trial he insisted and his attorneys insisted that he was not a murderer, that he would never bring any harm to his family. the defendant, mr. murdaugh, suggested that the killi
that that plays a big part of why. bret: well, philip holloway, jonna spilbor we appreciate you coming on last minute here as we get word that the jury has reached a verdict in the alec murdaugh trial in south carolina murdering accused of murdering his wife and son. for continuing coverage of this as the verdict comes in, we go to jesse watters primetime right now. jesse. jesse: thank you, bret. jesse: the fox news alert, a verdict has been reached in the trial of south carolina attorney alex murdaugh. murdaugh is accused of murdering his wife and his youngest son in an effort to cover up financial crimes. jury deliberations began just this morning so it looks like we are reaching a conclusion to this six-week trial. let s bring in jonathan serrie with the latest. jonathan? i had there, jesse. we got word from the pool liaison in the court that the jury reached a verdict at 6:41.
complex was. he wanted them to understand how the main house was a certain distance away from the kennels and they had to take golf carts or atvs or maybe all of it or maybe pickup trucks that were property of the family. he was trying to convince the jurors is that murdaugh could have been in the house taking a nap as he said and not heard a gunshot being fired in the south carolina night. not hear it. fired once, fired twice and alec murdaugh would not wake up from his so-called nap? so that was a field trip they made yesterday late in this trial. jesse: that is another mistake if you look back and maybe having him go and take the stand might have been another mistake. do you think they did a good job defending this guy? bill: i listened to a lot of analysts for the past week telling me that it wasn t raining outside.
probably not uncommon in a case like this. but we will see what happens tomorrow morning. back in court at 9:30. one of the intriguing things that happened earlier today is they had two alternate jurors on this case. just two. so there is 14 men and women and one was excused right before closing arguments were delivered by the defense during court today, which got you down to one. and so if there was a problem on the jury panel from that point forward, you were right on the line as to whether or not you could get a mistrial but you did not get this. jesse: how did you read into the fact that this guy was shedding a lot of tears during this trial and then when he found out he was guilty, he didn t express any emotion? bill: i felt one of the more stark images that the state prosecutor creighton waters painted for the jury is that his 22-year-old son, remember that snapchat video they were playing around 8:45 at night on this massive ranch in southeastern
then they get to hear his voice near the scene. they compound it because they have to call an audible during the trial. they have to say oh yeah, all right, that it was me and i lied because i don t trust sled and i was on oxy and there was all this other stuff going on. to me, that was the inflection point right there because not only is he a liar but now they see him backing out of something that he was telling the police and it s very clear he made that decision during the trial. here s the jury essentially saying wow, we witnessed him do this stuff that he has been doing apparently to everybody in that county. they had a front r row seat to e kind of nonsense that this guy lived his life by. i felt like right there was the point where i really felt no possibility of an acquittal. i m going to be honest with you, jesse. i thought there was a good chance of a hung jury. jesse: you did? you thought maybe one juror would hold out? i actually don t think he was that much of a debacl