Indictment claims woman murdered local jeweler
Grand jury says Patrick Murphy was robbed, stabbed in hotel room
A grand jury says Schuylkill County jeweler Patrick Murphy was stabbed and robbed by Magen Hall in a New Orleans hotel room.
A grand jury in New Orleans on Thursday handed down an indictment in the case of a Schuylkill County jeweler who was stabbed to death after checking into a hotel near the French Quarter with a woman who has a history of prostitution convictions.
Magen Hall, 25, of Munford, Tennessee, is charged with second-degree murder in the stabbing death of 62-year-old Patrick Murphy, District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro said in a statement. The three-count indictment by the Orleans Parish grand jury also charges Hall with armed robbery and obstruction of justice.
If convicted, Hall faces a mandatory lifetime prison sentence for the murder charge and up to 99 years on the other counts. Hall has remained jailed since her March 3 arrest under $750,000 bond, Cannizzaro said.
Hall, who also spells her first name Megan and Megen, was arrested several days after Murphy’s body was found by a housekeeper at the Empress Hotel in the city’s Treme neighborhood.
Police say Hall and Murphy checked into the hotel together around 2:10 a.m. on Feb. 28, days before Mardi Gras. A short time later, other guests heard an argument coming from Murphy’s room, followed by “sounds of a struggle that lasted about two minutes,” prosecutors said.
“Hall was seen exiting the hotel room alone and briskly walking out the front door at 3:42 a.m., believed to be leaving with some of Murphy’s possessions,” New Orleans police homicide detective Patrick Guidry wrote in an affidavit. “No one else was seen entering or leaving the room until the housekeeper, eight hours later.”
Murphy, of Pottsville, was stabbed three times, once in the neck and twice in the abdomen, court records say.
Hall has a history of prostitution arrests in New Orleans, Nashville and Houston, prosecutors said. Her attorney, John T. Fuller, did not return a phone message Thursday.
At a prior hearing, Fuller argued that Hall’s charges should be reduced to manslaughter because there appeared to be some type of struggle in the room that night, according to The New Orleans Advocate newspaper.
Murphy was the owner of the Murphy Jewelers chain — which has locations in Pottsville, Hamburg and the Promenade Shops in Upper Saucon Township — and one of the most prominent businessmen in Schuylkill County.
According to published reports, Murphy had been at a jewelry convention in Arizona and then he and his wife went to New Orleans on vacation the week of the slaying.
Murphy’s family could not immediately be reached for comment. A phone number associated with his home appeared to be disconnected Thursday.