Court clerk who helped with Alex Murdaugh's trial pleads guilty to showing sealed exhibits

ST. MATTHEWS, S.C. (AP) — The former court clerk in South Carolina who helped out with the murder trial of attorney Alex Murdaugh pleaded guilty Monday to criminal charges for showing sealed court exhibits to a photographer and lying about it in court.

Former Colleton County Clerk of Court Mary Rebecca “Becky” Hill pleaded guilty in Colleton County Circuit Court to four charges — obstruction of justice and perjury for showing a reporter photographs that were sealed court exhibits and then lying about it — as well as two counts of misconduct in office for taking bonuses and promoting through her public office a book she wrote on the trial.

Judge Heath Taylor sentenced Hill to a year of probation. The judge told Hill her sentence would have been much harsher if prosecutors had found that she had tampered with the Murdaugh jury.

Hill read a short statement where she asked the judge for a chance to do better.

"There is no excuse for the mistakes I made. I’m ashamed of them,” she said.

Hill was in charge of taking care of the jury, overseeing exhibits and helping the judge during Murdaugh's six-week trial that ended with murder convictions for killing his wife and son. The case involved power, danger, money and privilege and an attorney whose family had lorded over his small South Carolina county for nearly a century.

Hill has played a prominent part as Murdaugh appeals his convictions and a sentence of life without parole. His lawyers said Hill tried to influence jurors to vote guilty and that she was biased against Murdaugh for her book.

During Monday's hearing, solicitor Rick Hubbard told the judge that a journalist told investigators that Hill showed graphic crime scene photos to several media members. He did not name the journalist.

Murdaugh is also serving a separate sentence of decades in prison for admitting to stealing millions of dollars from settlements for clients who suffered horrible injuries or deaths — and from his family’s law firm.

An initial appeal by Murdaugh’s lawyers was denied. But Judge Jean Toal said she wasn’t sure Hill told the truth about her dealings with jurors and was “attracted by the siren call of celebrity” status.

Some of Hill’s charges concern Murdaugh’s murder trial. The arrest warrant said Hill violated a judge’s order to keep sealed photographs from the public. A second warrant said Hill lied to Toal during a January 2024 hearing when the judge asked: “Did you allow anyone from the press to view the sealed exhibits?”

One of the charges — misconduct in office — involved money that investigators said Hill took for herself. They said that included nearly $10,000 meant for bonuses from federal money meant to improve child support collection and about $2,000 in money from the Clerk of Court’s office.

The warrant on the other misconduct charge said Hill used her public role as clerk of court to promote her book on the Murdaugh trial on social media.

Hill was also accused last May of 76 counts of ethics violations. Officials said Hill allowed a photo of Murdaugh in a holding cell to be taken to promote her book on the trial and used county money to buy dozens of lunches for her staff, prosecutors and a vendor.

Hill also struck a deal with a documentary maker to use the county courtroom in exchange for promoting her book on the trial, which later she admitted had plagiarized passages, according to the South Carolina Ethics Commission complaint.

Hill resigned in March 2024 during the last year of her four-year term, citing the public scrutiny of Murdaugh’s trial and wanting to spend time with her grandchildren.

FILE- Colleton County Clerk of Court Rebecca Hill is sworn in before taking the stand to testify during the Alex Murdaugh jury-tampering hearing at the Richland County Judicial Center, Monday, Jan. 29, 2024, in Columbia, S.C. Hill, under investigation amid allegations of tampering with the jury in the Alex Murdaugh trial, announced her resignation on Monday, March 25, 2024. (Andrew J. Whitaker/The Post And Courier via AP, Pool, File)

Former Colleton County Clerk of Court Mary Rebecca "Becky" Hill awaits a court hearing on Monday, Dec. 8, 2025, in St. Matthews, S.C. (AP Photo/Jeffrey Collins)

Former Colleton County Clerk of Court Mary Rebecca "Becky" Hill awaits a court hearing on Monday, Dec. 8, 2025, in St. Matthews, S.C. (AP Photo/Jeffrey Collins)

PARIS (AP) — Workers at the Louvre Museum voted Monday for strikes to protest their work conditions, a ticket-price hike for non-European visitors and security weaknesses that a brazen daylight theft of France’s Crown Jewels highlighted in October.

In a letter announcing the strike action starting next Monday, which was addressed to France's culture minister and seen by The Associated Press, the CGT, CFDT and Sud unions asserted that “visiting the Louvre has become a real obstacle course” for the millions of people who come to admire its huge collections of art and artifacts.

The museum is in “crisis,” with insufficient resources and “increasingly deteriorated working conditions," said the unions’ strike notice to Culture Minister Rachida Dati.

“The theft of 19 October 2025 highlighted shortcomings in priorities that had long been reported,” the unions alleged.

The robbery gang made off with loot worth an estimated 88 million euros ($102 million). The museum director subsequently acknowledged a ″terrible failure" in security. The thieves took less than eight minutes to force their way into the museum and leave, using a freight lift to reach one of the building’s windows, angle grinders to cut into jewelry display cases, and motorbikes to make their escape.

The haul hasn’t been recovered. It includes a diamond-and-emerald necklace Napoleon gave to Empress Marie-Louise, jewels tied to two 19th century queens, Marie-Amélie and Hortense, and Empress Eugénie’s pearl-and-diamond tiara.

Upkeep of the museum's vast and historic buildings, which were a former palace for French royals, also hasn't kept pace with its success as one of France's leading attractions.

A water leak on Nov. 26 damaged several hundred publications stored in the museum's library of works specializing in Egyptian antiquities. The damaged works included revues and documents from the 19th and 20th century, the museum said. The opening of a valve triggered the leak in a network of water pipes that are due to be replaced next year, the museum said.

Last month, the Louvre also announced the temporary closure of some employees’ offices and one public gallery because of weakened floor beams.

In their strike notice, the unions said that antiquated facilities and insufficient staffing are impacting the visitor experience, forcing the closure of some displays. They demanded that resources be focused on building improvements and safeguarding the museum, its collections, visitors and employees.

“We are in a run-down museum which has shown its security weaknesses,” Christian Galani, a CGT union official representing Louvre workers, said in an AP interview. He said the strike-action vote by employees on Monday morning was unanimous and that the planned rolling strikes risked forcing the museum's closure.

“We need a change of gear,” he said.

FILE - A carpet at Le Louvre museum, Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2025 in Paris. (AP Photo/Christophe Ena, File)

FILE- People walk by an entrance of the Louvre museum, Thursday, Oct. 30, 2025 in Paris. (AP Photo/Emma Da Silva, file)