Passenger claims ‘civil conspiracy’ in boat crash investigation involving Murdaugh
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2019 Boat Crash Coverage
The crash of a Murdaugh family boat in 2019 killed 19-year-old Mallory Beach and started a chain of events that would remain in the news two years later. Here are the stories from that crash.
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This story first published July 8, 2021.
A passenger in the boat that crashed and killed Mallory Beach in 2019 believes some law enforcement officers may know about intentions to hamper the crash investigation and shift blame away from Paul Murdaugh, according to a civil petition filed in Richland County Thursday.
Connor Cook, one of six occupants on board the Sea Hunt boat when it crashed, suspects unnamed people may have intended to frame him as the driver of the boat, the petition says.
Cook believes that some evidence gathered at the boat crash scene is missing. His lawyers want to question the officers about failing to conduct an appropriate investigation, according to the petition.
Joe McCulloch and Kathy Schillaci, lawyers for Cook, filed the petition Thursday attached to new depositions from the separate wrongful death suit on behalf of Mallory Beach’s estate. They show at least five law enforcement officers were interviewed by attorneys about their actions during the boat crash investigation.
The petition, called a Rule 27 petition, is typically filed by a person who wants to provide testimony before a suit is filed. It precedes a lawsuit alleging a civil conspiracy or “other actions” related to the boat crash investigation, the filing says.
The petition names the S.C. Department of Natural Resources, the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office and “Unknown Others,” as defendants. In 20 days, Cook will ask a judge for an order allowing him to depose, and obtain the personal and law enforcement cell phones of, the officers who investigated the boat crash, according to the filing.
In the early morning hours of Feb. 24, 2019, a boat carrying six young people crashed in Archer’s Creek near Parris Island. One of the passengers, Mallory Beach, 19, was missing for a week before her body was found.
The now-deceased Paul Murdaugh, 20 at the time and from an influential family that ran the 14th Circuit Solicitor’s Office for nearly a century, was indicted on three counts of boating under the influence in April 2019.
Others on the boat were Anthony Cook, Connor Cook, Miley Altman and Morgan Doughty, Murdaugh’s then-girlfriend.
Last month, Paul Murdaugh and his mother, Maggie, were found shot to death on their sprawling hunting lodge in Islandton.
Rather than close the case because the defendant, Paul Murdaugh, had died, the S.C. Attorney General’s Office kept the investigation into the boat crash open.
A week and a half after the murders, Mark Tinsley, the lawyer representing the Beach family, said the family is confident the AG’s Office “will continue to investigate and prosecute any improprieties related to any attempts by any member of law enforcement to influence the original criminal investigation related to the boat crash.”
Thursday’s petition says the following law enforcement officers, who investigated the boat crash, may have information on a collusion to blame Connor Cook for the crash instead of Murdaugh:
▪ Former SCDNR officer and current S.C. Law Enforcement agent Michael Brock;
▪ SCNDR officer Austin Pritcher;
▪ Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office Sgt. John Leroy Keener, III;
▪ Former SCDNR officer Robin Camlin;
▪ Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office Sgt. Troy Andrew Krapf.
If a judge approves the order, Cook’s attorneys will ask the law enforcement officers about:
▪ The boat crash investigation;
▪ Statements collected from the boat crash passengers on body cameras and other video and audio footage;
▪ Physical evidence collected;
▪ DNA and other biological evidence collected;
▪ Phone, verbal and other communications throughout the investigation;
▪ “Investigative failures and deficiencies;”
▪ The officers’ relationship to the people involved in the investigation.
Cook believes law enforcement officers failed to conduct an appropriate investigation, according to the petition.
That failure includes the fact officers did not give Murdaugh a sobriety test and “other investigative irregularities,” according the filing. It led to the loss of evidence, the filing said.
Brock, Pritcher, Kenner, Camlin and Krapf may “have information as to a ‘campaign’ to cloud the investigatory issues and disseminate false information in the community with the intention of misleading law enforcement and prosecution charging parties, and the public, into wrongly and falsely believing Connor Cook should be arrested and charged as the boat operator with multiple counts of Felony Boating Under the Influence,” the filing said.
This story was originally published July 8, 2021 at 8:23 AM.
