EXCLUSIVE PHOTOS: Stephen Smith's Body Dug Up To Perform A Second Autopsy After New Information Surfaces In Alex Murdaugh Murder Case
The body of 19-year-old Stephen Smith has been exhumed to have a second autopsy performed, RadarOnline.com has learned.
Photos of Stephen's grave site have surfaced showing a green tarp over the hole where the young man's body was dug up. His tombstone was also moved behind another Smith family member's grave.
"The tombstone was just placed nearby," said a witness, who happened to the be in area and decided to visit the Smith grave since the Murdaugh case has consumed the minds of everyone living in the area and the country.
"We were shocked," the eyewitness told RadarOnline. "We know the exhumation was going to happen because it has been in the news but there has been no peep as too when it was going to happen."
Smith was found dead on a road in Hampton County, South Carolina near the home of convicted murderer Alex Murdaugh in July 2015. The original coroner's autopsy report labeled his death as part of a hit-and-run. The cause-of-death became suspect after people began to dig deeper.
Smith had a gash in his head believed to be from either a bullet or some form of blunt object. Also, the initial investigation into the site where his body was found showed no sign of debris from any car.
This led many to believe that the young man was intentionally murdered, not part of some accidental hit-and-run.
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Stephen's mom, Sandy Smith, fought for years to reclassify the case and commissioned a private autopsy to help figure out how her son actually died.
Authorities on the case sided with the mother and ultimately reclassified the case as a homicide in 2021 after new evidence was uncovered connecting the 19-year-old's death to the murder of Maggie and Paul Murdaugh.
South Carolina Law Enforcement Division Chief Mark Keel released a statement in March confirming that while the department did not feel the need to exhume Stephen’s body to rule his death a homicide, he and his officers will "be present and participate in any exhumation of Stephen's body to gather more evidence."
Eric Blank, the Smith family's attorney, told the DailyMail, "We have a chance to right eight years of wrongs, and we intend to do just that."
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There is no word on if or when the second autopsy results will be made public.
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