Alex Murdaugh, who comes from a long line of lawyers and prosecutors, stands before a jury for the first time at the Colleton Courthouse. He is accused of having murdered both his wife Maggie and his son Paul on the evening of June 7, 2021.

This trial marks the end of a fascinating story that gripped the United States for months. An unusual case involving financial crimes, drug abuse, corruption, attempted suicide disguised as murder, and other mysterious deaths in 2015, 2018, and 2019.

But more than anything else, this story explores America's perception of itself: the notion of family, success, power, violence. . . . The tale of a declining dynasty in a declining country.
Arthur Cerf lived in Colleton County, South Carolina, for eight weeks to write about this high-profile trial, which he brilliantly recounts as one powerful family's fall from grace.

50 States of Crime: France's leading true crime journalists investigate America's most notorious cases, one for every state in the Union, offering up fresh perspectives on famously storied crimes and reflecting, in the process, a dark national legacy that leads from coast to coast.