Elvage Girard Murphy, was born in Buffalo, NY, on August 31, 1965. He attended Edinboro University of Pennsylvania, earning a B.S. in Business Administration with a minor in Political Science (1987) and a B.S. in Economics (1988). In 1993, he earned his Juris Doctor from the West Virginia University College of Law. He served as a prosecutor for the Erie County Office of District Attorney from 1995 through 2001. He, then, served as an Assistant Public Defender for the County of Erie before accepting a faculty position with Edinboro University where he taught for over 16 years. Elvage retired in 2015 and relocated to South Carolina.