Buster Murdo hides out on “Buster’s Island” after his father’s conviction for murder

Many observers of Alex Murdo’s six-week double-murder trial took pity on the 54-year-old disgraced lawyer’s only surviving son, red-haired Buster.

The 26-year-old man, who was in court every day at his father’s trial, was left almost an orphan, his mother and brother are dead, and his father is sentenced to life in prison for their murders.

“No one with heart and soul can sympathize with this young man,” Columbia, South Carolina attorney Joseph M. McCulloch Jr., a friend of the Murdo family, told The Post. “For him, it was a tragedy on top of a tragedy. I don’t know how anyone can stand it. I’m glad he has a girlfriend who is so supportive.”

But more dark clouds are gathering over the former law student, one source with knowledge of the situation told The Post on Friday.

“Buster is next…your son is next, Alex!” shouted a witness as Alex Murdo was led into a police van after his sentencing on Friday morning.

The person was apparently referring to the ongoing investigation by the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) and the long-running rumor of Buster’s possible involvement in the death of Stephen Smith in 2015.

Stephen’s body was found on a rural road in Hampton County, a few miles from the Murdo hunting lodge where Maggie and Paul Murdo were killed in June 2021.

His skull was partially crushed, there was a hole in his forehead, and his shoulder was dislocated, according to documents in the file and photographs seen by his mother.

Based on these inconsistencies, Sandy Smith believes that her son’s body was deliberately left on the road after he was killed to make it look like a hit-and-run accident, and that there could have been a conspiracy between the local authorities and possibly the Murdo family. to cover up Steven’s death.

Both Sandy and former Highway Patrol Investigator Todd Proctor, who oversaw Smith’s case, had previously told The Post that they believed Stephen may have been killed, although the death was initially ruled a hit-and-run.

Sandy has long been open about her belief that the Murdo family, including Buster, may have had something to do with Steven’s death.

Speaking after Murdo’s conviction, Sandy told The Post: “The jury did an excellent job. They have seen through the lies, and Murdo is finally defeated.

“Now that this case is closed, they can take on Steven’s case full-time.”

Buster, also known as Richard Alexander Murdo, Jr., named after his father and great-grandfather, lives with his lawyer girlfriend Brooklyn White in an apartment she owns in Hilton Head, South Carolina.

But after Buster broke down outside court on Friday, minutes after his father’s conviction, his uncles took him to what is known as “Buster’s Island,” a property on Chechesy Creek, near Beaufort, South Carolina, that belonged to the Murdo family. since the 1970s, a source close to the family said.

“There’s not much warmth in the Hamptons these days for Alex or Buster,” one Hampton resident whose family has known Murdo for decades told The Post. “I think [Buster] stay with his uncles and stay at Hilton Head. I don’t see him coming back here.”

Buster’s cool and calm demeanor, which he displayed in the court gallery every day of the trial, as well as in the witness stand, evaporated on Friday.

Murdo, 54, was found guilty on Thursday after the jury deliberated for just three hours. Maggie, 52, and Paul, 22, were gunned down in the family game park in South Carolina on the night of June 7, 2021.

“Buster was doing pretty well until the cameras caught him, but then he passed out,” said a family friend who was at the Colleton County Courthouse.

“He was crying uncontrollably. uncles [Alex’s brothers, John Marvin Murdaugh and Randy Murdaugh] finally put him in the car.”

Buster showed no such emotion when he was questioned by defense attorney Jim Griffin, an old friend of the Murdo family. He did not flinch when asked about how his father broke the news of his mother and brother’s death to him.

“He asked me if I was sitting and I said yes,” Buster testified. “Then he spoke strangely, and then he told me that my mother and brother had been shot. I kind of just sat there for a minute. I was shocked”.

The fiery-haired surviving son met his longtime girlfriend Brooklynn White at the University of South Carolina School of Law, his father’s alma mater. Buster was also a law student there until he was expelled, allegedly due to a plagiarism incident. Wall Street Journal reported at the time. Local publication The Post and Courier reported that “the family paid a well-connected Columbia lawyer, Butch Bowers, about $60,000 to help secure Buster’s retransfer.”

Buster eventually graduated from Wofford College in Spartanburg, South Carolina in 2018.

“That’s where the kids here go when they can’t get to Washington and Lee,” said a local.

It is unclear what Buster currently does for a living, but prior to Alex’s arrest, he worked at his father’s former law firm.

Another family acquaintance said: “I didn’t know Buster well, but he always treated me well. I just wasn’t sure what he was like when he wasn’t acting so well.”