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Jul 28, 2024 · According to Sandy Smith's attorneys, SLED now has all of the evidence in the Stephen Smith case, including his phone and tablet, and an investigative grand jury is zeroing in on potential...
- 42 min
- Gayane Keshishyan Mendez
Mar 22, 2023 · Authorities have confirmed they are investigating Stephen Smith's death as a homicide, nearly eight years after the teen was found dead in the middle of a rural road.
- 3 min
- Meredith Deliso
Dec 6, 2023 · The phone and tablet of a South Carolina teenager found dead near the Murdaugh family home have finally been unlocked by investigators eight years after he was killed. Stephen Smith, 19, was ...
- 44 sec
- Graeme Massie
- Overview
- A SON'S LAST WORDS TO HIS MOTHER
- RUMORS SWIRL OF MURDAUGH INVOLVEMENT
- A NEW LOOK A STEPHEN SMITH'S COLD CASE
- ALEX MURDAUGH'S FINANCIAL CRIMES
- A MOTHER'S FIGHT FOR JUSTICE
Years before disgraced South Carolina attorney Alex Murdaugh was convicted for the murders of his wife and son, there was another mystery in Murdaugh country — the death of Stephen Smith, a 19-year-old gay man whose body was found in the middle of a rural road on July 8, 2015. The medical examiner ruled it a hit and run.
For years, his mother Sandy Smith wanted a second opinion, convinced Stephen's death was no accident.
"There was no vehicle debris, no broken headlight … paint scrapes or anything," Hampton County Guardian editor Michael DeWitt Jr. tells "48 Hours."
The case went cold until the murders of Paul and Maggie Murdaugh brought it back to life.
Frustrated by a lack of answers, Sandy Smith is working with a team of lawyers and experts to find out what happened to her son. "48 Hours" has obtained exclusive access to the findings of an independent investigation into Stephen Smith's unsolved death.
"The injuries can tell us so much about what happened," says Dr. Michelle DuPre, a former investigator and forensic pathologist who oversaw the examination of Smith's body. DuPre spoke to "48 Hours" contributor and CBS News national correspondent Nikki Battiste. Just as important as what they found, DuPre says, is what they didn't find.
Like his mother Sandy, Stephen Smith was born a fighter.
Sandy Smith: He was a preemie. He weighed two pounds, 12 ounces. And —
Nikki Battiste: A twin?
Sandy Smith: Yeah, a twin.
Born at 27 weeks with his sister Stephanie, Sandy says Stephen couldn't breathe on his own. After several months, she was told he might not make it, and she was finally allowed to hold her baby for the first time.
Nikki Battiste: How was that moment?
Soon after Stephen Smith was killed, Hampton County Guardian managing editor Michael DeWitt says he began hearing persistent rumors all over town.
Nikki Battiste: What are the rumors?
Michael DeWitt: That at least one Murdaugh child was in a vehicle with other boys and allegedly, somebody in the vehicle … struck the young man with a baseball bat and killed him.
Sandy says those same rumors hit her doorstep as soon as Stephen's body was taken for an autopsy.
Sandy Smith: It made no sense to me.
Nikki Battiste: At any point did you think that someone in the Murdaugh family was involved?
The murders of Paul and Maggie Murdaugh in June 2021 caused a seismic shift in small-town Hampton and gave Sandy Smith a lifeline she desperately needed.
Sandy Smith: It took this … to get Stephen's name back out there so somebody would start payin' attention.
In a strange twist of fate, while investigating the murders of Paul and Maggie Murdaugh, SLED announced it had stumbled on a new lead in Stephen's death and would be taking over the case. They did not say what that evidence was.
Nikki Battiste: It seems like all roads lead to the Murdaugh family around here.
Sandy Smith: Yes.
Nikki Battiste: Is that coincidence, is there a reason for that?
As a grand jury zeroes in on potential suspects in Stephen Smith's death, the legal wrangling hasn't slowed down for Alex Murdaugh.
Michael DeWitt: You've got local charges. You've got state charges. … the legal civil cases are gonna go on for years.
ALEX MURDAUGH (in court Nov. 17, 2023): I am guilty, yes sir.
On Nov. 17, 2023, Alex Murdaugh agreed to a plea deal that encompasses all of the state financial charges he faced for defrauding and stealing millions from clients and law partners. He had already pleaded guilty to 22 federal conspiracy, wire fraud, and money laundering charges.
Nikki Battiste: Alex preyed on the vulnerable whom he also thought would never figure out his schemes.
Eric Bland: Correct. … It's people that are at the worst times of their lives. … where you need a lawyer to be the best for you, not the worst for you.
Months after his blockbuster trial, convicted double murderer Alex Murdaugh and the "crime of the century" are still Hampton's biggest attractions.
Michael DeWitt: Almost every day somebody's coming by taking a picture of the law firm or riding out to Moselle taking pictures. … they just can't get enough.
The Murdaugh craze was on full display at an auction for the family's personal items from their Moselle property. The infamous leather couch set where Alex testified he took a catnap while his wife and son were murdered sold for $30,000.
And Maggie's dog Bubba, who helped prosecutors prove Alex was actually at the crime scene, has become a local folk hero.
Michael DeWitt: If that … rambunctious yellow lab hadn't been … doing what … labs like to do, chase birds … we might not have solved this case and we might not have gotten a conviction.
Alex Murdaugh's voice calling Bubba was caught in the background of cellphone video Paul took minutes before he was killed.
- Correspondent
- 42 min
- CBS News
- Nikki Battiste
Jun 21, 2023 · Stephen Smith, 19, was found dead on July 8, 2015. Courtesy of Sandy Smith. Bland, who represents Smith’s family with his law partner, Ronnie Richter, told WIS he received the promising update in...
- 38 sec
- Olivia Land
Jun 23, 2024 · Smith, a nursing student, was found dead on a backcountry road in Hampton, South Carolina— miles from the Murdaugh’s family hunting estate. While authorities immediately deemed the death...
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Mar 23, 2023 · Stephen Smith's death is being investigated as a homicide, challenging the determination Smith died in a hit-and-run, officials say following Alex Murdaugh's conviction.
