Gone South

At a 2024 House Judiciary oversight hearing, an exchange about racially motivated violence goes viral after FBI chief Kash Patel appears to stumble over a question about the 2015 Charleston church massacre. The moment sparks a grim question: how does a tragedy this defining slip out of view?

Jed Lipinski revisits what happened at Charleston’s Emanuel AME Church when 21-year-old Dylann Roof sat in on Bible study, then opened fire and killed nine Black parishioners. With New Yorker writer Jelani Cobb and Charleston native Jack Hitt, we trace the deeper history Roof targeted: Denmark Vesey, the long shadow of Confederate “heritage,” and the symbols that still shape South Carolina’s public life.

From the Confederate flag’s removal to today’s backlash, this is a story about memory, denial, and what the country chooses to learn, or forget.

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On September 9, 2023, a road-rage encounter in South Carolina turns into a nine-mile chase and ends with 33-year-old Scott Spivey dead on a rural back road. Police quickly call it self-defense under Stand Your Ground.

But Scott’s sister, Jennifer Foley, doesn’t buy it. As the case is closed and sealed off, she starts building her own timeline, until a civil lawsuit forces the release of the evidence file: thousands of documents, photos, body-cam and dash-cam footage, and recorded phone calls that suggest the official story was shaped from the start.

Wall Street Journal reporter Valerie Bauerlein and attorney Mark Tinsley follow the trail into a world of conflicts of interest, missing (or buried) evidence, and a system that treats the shooter as the victim.

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Wall Street Journal reporter Valerie Bauerlein, who covered the Alex Murdaugh murder trial gavel to gavel, explains why the most revealing part of the Murdaugh saga isn’t Alex at all. It’s the 100-year legal dynasty that made him possible.

We go back to Hampton County, South Carolina, a post–Civil War “burned county” built to enforce White Rule, and follow three generations of Murdaugh power: Randolph Murdaugh Sr., the solicitor who learned how to bend the system; “Buster” Murdaugh, a charismatic, ruthless prosecutor tied to bootlegging and alleged jury tampering; and Randolph Murdaugh III, the smoother operator who kept the machine humming, until cameras and modern technology started capturing what used to happen in the shadows.

From the family’s early courtroom tactics and railroad lawsuits to the 2019 boat crash that killed Mallory Beach and the frantic hospital damage-control captured on security footage, this is the story of how a dynasty built its power and how it finally collapsed from the inside.

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Gone South, the Edward R. Murrow award-winning podcast, is back for a fifth season. Join host Jed Lipinski as he investigates new southern-based stories each week. 

Nearly six decades after Pauline Pusser’s murder, Tennessee investigators finally reveal what really happened. The TBI’s new findings suggest Walking Tall sheriff Buford Pusser staged the ambush that made him famous — and may have killed his wife. Host Jed Lipinski follows the fallout in Adamsville as investigators, locals, and lifelong believers wrestle over one question: what happens when a legend falls?

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In 1967, Sheriff Buford Pusser said gunmen ambushed his car, killing his wife Pauline and inspiring the Walking Tall legend. Nearly six decades later, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation exhumed Pauline’s body after learning no autopsy was ever done. Reporter Jed Lipinski travels to Adamsville, Tennessee, where new witnesses and old secrets threaten to upend the myth of Buford Pusser.

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In the 40th and final episode of Season 4, Jed Lipinski answers questions about the making of Gone South.

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After a federal witness is gunned down on his mother‘s doorstep, investigators began unraveling a murder conspiracy at the heart of operation sideswipe. In this episode, Reporter Mike Perlstein walks us through a dramatic bond hearing and the shocking details that finally brought two key players to justice.

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Dozens of fake car crashes. Millions in bogus injury claims. And a murder that stunned federal investigators. This episode tells the story of ‘Operation Sideswipe’, the federal probe that uncovered a widespread fraud ring operating on Louisiana highways. Part one of a new two-part series.

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In Part 2, Greg Leon faces trial for the Valentine’s Day shooting. As new attorneys take over, and witness tampering allegations surface, a once-sympathetic defendant watches his case - and his fate - slip out of his hands.

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