Do Hampton County court files indicate Mallory Beach’s family got a $1.7M settlement?
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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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Two documents filed in Hampton County Probate Court in late June show a $1.7 million settlement was approved for individuals whose circumstances match those of Mallory Beach’s parents.
Nowhere in the documents are specific people — the aggrieved, the defendants, even the attorneys who filed the settlement — identified. Everyone involved is described as Jane or John Doe — except the probate judge who signed the order.
But the scant details in the settlement are the same as the circumstances of Beach’s death: the same date of the accident, the same law firm representing the victims, and the same descriptions of the victim’s family.
Filed on June 28, the order approving the death settlement states that a female was involved in an accident that resulted in her death on Feb. 24, 2019.
That day, a 17-foot boat allegedly driven by Paul Murdaugh crashed, killing Beach.
The settlement filings were in Hampton County Probate Court, the same county where Beach’s family is suing the Murdaughs in civil court. That civil lawsuit — filed against the Parker’s gas station, Alex Murdaugh and his son, Buster Murdaugh — is still pending.
The law firm representing the Beach family in that case, Gooding & Gooding P.A., is listed as receiving attorney fees and costs in the death settlement documents.
In the settlement documents, Jane Doe filed the petition as mother and personal representative of daughter Jane Roe’s estate. In the Hampton civil lawsuit, Renee Beach, Mallory Beach’s mother, filed the lawsuit as personal representative of her daughter’s estate.
Mark Tinsley, Renee Beach’s lawyer with the firm Gooding & Gooding, said he could not comment on anything his clients did or didn’t do.
He would not say whether the June settlement and the wrongful death lawsuit both stem from the death of Mallory Beach, or whether the unnamed defendants in the settlement are the same defendants who were dropped from the original lawsuit filed by Renee Beach.
“Any settlement in the pending action of the Beach case would have to go through Judge (Daniel) Hall” (the judge overseeing the wrongful death suit), he said. “Anything else that’s happened would be something separate.”
The anonymous wrongful death and survival action settlement was paid from the insurance providers of six anonymous people or parties. Those parties are never identified.
But six parties — Luther’s Rare & Well Done, Kristy Wood, James Wood, Randolph Murdaugh III, Randolph Murdaugh III as Trustee of the Murdaugh Residence Trust 2, and the Murdaugh Residence Trust 2 — were removed as defendants in Renee Beach’s wrongful death suit in 2019.
Hampton County Probate Judge Sheila Odom’s order approving the anonymous settlement, signed June 28, came after the anonymous petitioner and the decedent’s father testified at a hearing. The date of that hearing is not included in the order.
Who paid the settlement?
The six respondents to Jane Doe’s petition for approval of settlement are listed as: Jane Doe #2, John Doe #1, John Doe #2, John Doe #3, John Doe #4 and John Doe #5.
According to Odom’s order, Jane Doe #2 and John Doe #1 were insured with Heritage Property & Casualty Insurance Co., which provided $500,000 of liability coverage. Of the available coverage, an arbitrator awarded the petitioner $279,600, according to the order.
John Doe #2 had a $1 million liability policy with Hudson Specialty Insurance Co., according to the order. An arbitrator awarded the petitioner $559,200 from the coverage, according to the order.
Respondent John Doe #3 was insured under a $500,000 liability coverage policy from Auto Owners Insurance Co. The arbitrator awarded $279,600 from the coverage, according to the order.
John Doe #4 and John Doe #5 each had $500,000 liability coverage policies with Great Lakes Insurance SE, according to the order. The arbitrator awarded $279,600 from each.
The total combined settlement from the anonymous respondents — including accrued interest — was $1,700,032.45, the order said.
That settlement was divided into two claims: $850,032.45 to the wrongful death claim and $850,000 to the survival claim.
How the money was allocated
The $850,000 settlement paid to the survival action claim was split nine ways, according to the judge’s order:
▪ $283,333.33 paid to Gooding and Gooding, P.A. for attorneys’ fees;
▪ $28,145.56 paid to Gooding and Gooding, P.A. for attorneys’ costs;
▪ $470.50 to petitioner to pay medical bills that the decedent owed to Jasper County EMS. The order said the bills were unrelated to “this incident.”
▪ $576 to petitioner to pay medical bills that the decedent owed to Allendale County Hospital — also unrelated to the incident.
▪ $5,538.48 payable to the U.S. Department of Education to satisfy decedent’s student loan;
▪ $7,915.20 to decedent’s father for reimbursement of funeral expenses;
▪ $4,038.48 to decedent’s father for reimbursement of a grave monument;
▪ $1,532.31 to Hampton County Probate Court for additional probate costs;
▪ $518,450.16 to be distributed to the petitioner and decedent’s father in equal shares.
The $850,032.45 settlement paid to the wrongful death action was split three ways:
▪ $283,333.33 to Gooding and Gooding, P.A. for attorneys’ fees;
▪ $28,145.56 to Gooding and Gooding, P.A. for attorneys’ costs;
▪ $538,553.56 to be distributed to the petitioner and decedent’s father in equal shares.
The judge’s order states that “nothing in this order ends or affects those other claims which are pending in another matter related to this incident.”
Renee Beach lawsuit against Murdaughs
Renee Beach’s wrongful death lawsuit was filed a little over a month after 19-year-old Mallory Beach was killed in the boat crash on Feb. 24, 2019 boat.
Paul Murdaugh was accused of driving the boat while under the influence and faced criminal charges brought by the S.C. Attorney General’s Office.
The crash thrust the prominent Murdaugh family into the spotlight in a complicated saga that now stretches more than two years, with several unrelated criminal investigations and deaths tied to the family.
Mallory Beach is one of them. Renee Beach’s lawsuit seeks damages from Alex Murdaugh, Paul’s father and owner of the boat that crashed; Paul’s older brother, Buster, who gave him his ID to buy beer; and Parkers 55, the gas station chain where the underage Murdaugh purchased beer.
The lawsuit initially was also filed against Kristy and James Wood, accused of serving alcohol at an oyster roast before the boat crash; Luther’s Rare Well & Done, where Paul Murdaugh and Connor Cook bought shots before the crash; Randolph Murdaugh III, Paul Murdaugh’s grandfather, sued both individually and as a trustee of a family trust and the trust itself.
In May 2019, an amended lawsuit was filed, and those six defendants were dropped.
This story was originally published October 23, 2021 at 6:30 AM.
