$15M OK’D in Murdaugh boat crash

A South Carolina judge has approved a $15 million settlement between Mallory Beach’s family and Greg Parker, the owner of a convenience store that sold an underage Paul Murdaugh alcohol the night Beach was killed in a boat crash.

Judge Daniel T. Hall approved the settlement Thursday at a hearing in York County. After four years of legal wrangling, Hall’s ruling has largely ended one of the most bitterly fought chapters in the Murdaugh saga.

The Beach family’s lawsuit against Parker and Hampton County lawyer Alex Murdaugh after their daughter’s death in February 2019, and the pressure by their attorney, Mark Tinsley, led to the exposure of Alex Murdaugh’s precarious financial situation and his thefts from clients and his own firm.

This year, Murdaugh was convicted of double murder after prosecutors argued his financial troubles led him to kill his wife, Maggie, and son Paul.

The total settlement approved Thursday amounted to $15,517,892.03. It will be supplemented by the sale of Maggie Murdaugh’s Mercedes SUV once it has been released by authorities and the South Carolina attorney general’s office, who are looking to download additional GPS data off of the vehicle before it is sold, Tinsley said.

In describing why the Beach family decided it was time to settle, Tinsley said: “We compromised this case to achieve what they want, which was a level of objective accountability for their daughter, in the hope that this does not happen again.”

The settlement means that a much-anticipated civil trial in the lawsuit will not be held.