An Almanac of Infamy

The Connecticut Supreme Court has been notified by State prosecutor James Killen that he plans to appeal their decision, made earlier this month, to overturn Michael Skakel's conviction in the murder of Martha Moxley. The appeal has already generated some controversy as the state missed the deadline, by two days, to request that the state Supreme Court issue a stay on their decision pending a "final decision" by the US Supreme Court. Killen, however, says the missed deadline should have no effect on whether a stay is granted. Skakel has been out of prison on bail since 2013 while the state court was considering his latest appeal. The chances of his case going before the US Supreme Court are small, considering that they receive hundreds of appeals request each year and only choose to hear a handful. Skakel's lawyer, so far, has issued no comment.

While Michael Skakel and his Kennedy relations are celebrating the recent decision by the Connecticut Supreme Court to overturn his 2002 murder conviction in the death of Martha Moxley, Martha's mother Dorothy is vowing to devoting the rest of her life to making sure that Skakel returns to prison. In an interview with Daily Mail Online, she stated "I was 43 years old when my Martha was murdered. I was 70 years old when her killer was convicted. I am going to be 86 in a month. Actually, half of my life has been spent on this case, and I guess I'll spend the rest of my life on it." She says she was floored by Court's decision and suspects that judges were heavily influenced by Skakel's cousin Bobby Kennedy Jr. Kennedy had written articles and a book insisting that Skakel was innocent. Moxley says she has spoken to prosecutors since the Court's decision and they have told her that no decision has been made about whether Skakel should be retried. She believ...

Today the Connecticut Supreme Court, in a 4-3 vote, vacated Michael Skakel's conviction in the 1975 murder of Martha Moxley. The court cited inadequate counsel as the basis for its decision, which is a reversal of the ruling the court made just 16 months ago when judges voted 4-3 that Skakel's conviction should stand. Many experts believe that it's highly unlikely that prosecutors will retry Skakel. Martha Moxley was just 15 years old, when on the night of October 30, 1975, she was bludgeoned and stabbed to death. Initially, even though the Greenwich, CT police had a few prime suspects in mind, no arrests were made and the case remained cold for decades. Then, in 1991, during the rape trial of William Kennedy Smith, a rumor surfaced that Smith was at the Skakel house the night of the murder and might have been involved. Although the rumor proved to be untrue it led to a new investigation into the case. Rushton Skakel, father of Michael, hired his own investigators and wh...