COLUMBIA, S.C. — Once he stood beside people accused of crimes, representing them in their time of trial.
But on Thursday, Cory Fleming — a once-respected criminal defense lawyer from Beaufort and close friend of now-convicted double-murderer Alex Murdaugh — stood in front of federal Judge Richard Gergel and pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud in a scheme involving the theft of $4.3 million.
The crime to which Fleming, 54, pleaded guilty involved his role in a plot to steal $4.3 million in insurance proceeds from the sons of the Murdaugh family’s housekeeper, Gloria Satterfield, who died of injuries received in a fall on Murdaugh’s estate in February 2018.
