A GoFundMe campaign for the exhumation and autopsy of Stephen Smith, the teen who died eight years ago on a South Carolina road

The family of a teenager who was found dead eight years ago on a road near the hunting estate of disgraced South Carolina attorney Alex Murdaugh says they’re going to exhume his body for an independent autopsy.

The body of Stephen Smith was discovered on a two-lane road in South Carolina in 2015. His family has never accepted a medical examiner’s ruling that Smith died from a hit-and-run. State agents agree that foul play was involved.

Smith’s family has raised more than $84,000 through a GoFundMe page for an exhumation and a private autopsy that Smith’s mother says will seek “a new, unbiased look at his body and an accurate determination of his cause of death based on facts.”

Smith knew the Murdaughs; he went to Wade Hampton High School with Buster. Just weeks ago, Alex Murdaugh was found guilty of killing his wife and youngest son at their property in the area.

SLED announced in June 2021 it was opening the investigation into Smith’s death based on information learned while probing the murders of Margaret “Maggie” Murdaugh and her son Paul Murdaugh earlier that month. It hasn’t said anything about what was found.

Murdaugh has been found guilty of the two murders, but he still faces other charges related to financial crimes and admitted to on the stand at his trial.

After the killings, there was a spotlight on Stephen Smith’s death due to the fact that police reports mentioned the Murdaugh family name several times, even mentioning that Alex’s surviving son might have been involved.

During an audio interview with a witness, one trooper says thatBuster was on their radar. The Murdaughs know that. But why he was on their radar is unclear. He and nobody else has been charged in the case.

Murdaugh said he had not spoken out earlier about Smith’s “tragic death” because he was trying to maintain his privacy while grieving his mother and brother, and following his father’s criminal trial.

Smith had a head injury but no other immediately apparent injuries. Initial reports mentioned the possibility that Smith’s head jury might have been a gunshot wound, according to police documents posted online by the FITSNews site.

Notes from investigators in the case file say that “according to family, Stephen would never have been walking in the middle of the roadway” and that he was “very skittish.”

His car was found with the gas tank door open and the gas cap on the side of the car that was three miles away. The car wouldn’t start even though the battery in the vehicle was functional.

Smith reveals a fling with his twin sister and a trip to the Deep Sea: What can we learn from the case of his death?

“Our job is not to find out who did it,” Bland told reporters in a virtual news conference Monday. “That’s not what we do, we’re not law enforcement, we’re not doing a criminal case … What we’re really trying to do is give a mother answers.”

The investigation will also involve looking at Smith’s life, Bland added, and what kind of communication the teen had and who he was associating with in the days before his death. Anything learned, Bland said, would be shared with law enforcement.

“We do believe it was a murder,” as South Carolina Law Enforcement Division Chief Mark Keel told The State newspaper. “We don’t believe it was a hit-and-run.”

Sandy is taking new actions to learn more about her son’s death in July of 2015, and SLED issued an update. That includes arranging for an autopsy and exhumation. She has raised about $90,000 to fund her effort.

Smith said that Stephen told his twin sister that he had a fling with the boy. “He also told me that he and the boy had a deep sea fishing trip planned for July. Stephen died on the eighth of July.”

The Cause of Death Determination of the Smith Family’s Accidental Death Case at the Smith Detector, which is an Investigative Service for Highway Patrol

The cause-of-death determination was crucial, as Smith’s death became a matter for the highway patrol, which investigates vehicular deaths, instead of SLED, which helps local agencies investigate homicides.

“We don’t believe it ever elevated to invoke the full investigatory authority of SLED,” Ronnie Richter, an attorney for Smith’s family, told NPR on Wednesday. “It has now.”

The Murdaugh murders took place about 8 miles away from where Smith’s body was found, so this phase of the Smith case is playing out against that.

With Murdaugh’s murder trial now over, Smith’s attorneys say, SLED is able to focus more resources on solving the 2015 case. The agency is also asking anyone with relevant information to call 803-737-9000 and ask for Investigative Services.