CT - Michael Skakel & the murder of Martha Moxley, Greenwich, 1975 *Not Guilty*

blueclouds

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Skakel's appeal attorneys Hope Seeley and Hubert Santos urged the Connecticut Supreme Court to throw out the murder conviction on the grounds of prosecutorial misconduct and an expired statute of limitations, which they say should have prevented Skakel's prosecution more than 20 years after the crime occurred.



DIDN'T KNOW THERE'S A "STATUE OF LIMITATIONS TO MURDER! :furious: :furious: :furious: :furious:
 
this will go nowhere...and the statute they refer to is that he was a juvenile at the time of murder. the court already ruled on this prior to trial. he has money, this is not a surprise. they will take it to the supremes i'm sure.
 
Thank you for that info Linda, now I can sleep tonight. I firmly believe they absolutely have the right guy. what a weeney coward.
 
sleep tight...just another cowardly overprivileged kennedy family member.(with apologies to Robert) i did not say, however, that the likes of alan dershowitz could not get him released if he got involved...he got von bulow off. who was also guilty as sin.
 
His attorneys raised the issue of the expired statute of limitations when he first went to trial, claiming that Connecticut's then-evolving statute of limitations for murder set a five-year limit on prosecutions in 1976.

Prosecutors argued that the state didn't recognize a statute of limitations for prosecuting murders. The issue was put off as a post-conviction matter.
--->>

His defense continues to maintain that the case should not have been transferred from Juvenile Court to Superior Court on the grounds that the lower court did not properly investigate the matter.

"If the Juvenile Court had known that the defendant had grown up in a dysfunctional family with an abusive, alcoholic father ... that the defendant suffered from a severe learning disability and alcoholism himself, that he lived a productive life helping others ... the court would have been in a better position to designate the defendant under the supervision of the juvenile system," his attorneys wrote.

But prosecutors have called the transfer "the only reasonable route," noting that Skakel was 40 at the time of his arrest.


Pretty much sums it all up.
 
LovelyPigeon said:
His attorneys raised the issue of the expired statute of limitations when he first went to trial, claiming that Connecticut's then-evolving statute of limitations for murder set a five-year limit on prosecutions in 1976.

Prosecutors argued that the state didn't recognize a statute of limitations for prosecuting murders. The issue was put off as a post-conviction matter.
--->>

His defense continues to maintain that the case should not have been transferred from Juvenile Court to Superior Court on the grounds that the lower court did not properly investigate the matter.

"If the Juvenile Court had known that the defendant had grown up in a dysfunctional family with an abusive, alcoholic father ... that the defendant suffered from a severe learning disability and alcoholism himself, that he lived a productive life helping others ... the court would have been in a better position to designate the defendant under the supervision of the juvenile system," his attorneys wrote.

But prosecutors have called the transfer "the only reasonable route," noting that Skakel was 40 at the time of his arrest.


Pretty much sums it all up.

These claims are outrageous and to be expected in a "no-win" appeals case.

First, blueclouds, the was a loophole in Connecticut law, at the time, which did put a statute of limitations on murder. It was subsequently fixed through legislature. Raising this is flimsy and strictly a technicality--in other words, they are not denying Skakel did it, but protesting that the letter of the law, as it was written in 1975, is not being followed.

The second claim of "family dysfunction and learning disabilities" is also malarky. IF Skakel had either confessed to the crime in 1975 or had been charged and found guilty then, these circumstances may have mitigated his punishment phase. TODAY, they are irrelevant, at best. Ditto his not being tried (at age 41) in juvenile court. It would have been inappropriate to file these charges in juvenile court, given the man's age when charged. He shouldn't benefit from escaping justice for nearly three decades by beingtried in a court designed for children and teens.

This man needs to admit what actually happened that night, expose the cover-up that ensued and the 27 years this poor girl's family wondered and suffered and atone for what he did. Until the appeals run out, expect these lawyers to fire off these softball apellate issues.
 
JC422, the defense does claim that Skakel "didn't do it". He pled innocent to charges and thus the resulting trial.

This particular appeal is based on what you note--that the law was changed and the defense claims that it should not include "grandfathering" Skakel into the ammended statutes.

You have every right to believe Skakel guilty after his conviction, but his defense has every right to appeal on various legal grounds.
 
Cases like this are why the appeals process should be changed.
 
"You have every right to believe Skakel guilty after his conviction, but his defense has every right to appeal on various legal grounds.


What is that supposed to mean? Of course I have the right to believe Skakel guilty after his conviction (FYI---I thought him guilty prior...). You are reinforcing my post that his defense is grabbing at "technicality" straws.

To reiterate, since your post confuses me, Skakel did plead not guilty prior to his initial trial. NONE of these appellate issues claim he's not guilty, just technically "not responsible" or wrongly jailed due to a faulty law which was amended.

Again, if Skakel wanted to benefit from this legal loophole, he should have gone before a judge when he was a juvenile. His hiding from justice shouldn't serve to benefit him!!

Timex, he can and will appeal until he is an old man--or until his appeals run out, but it's a no-brainer. He's been tried and convicted. I agree with your post in that the victim'sfamily shouldn't have to suffer these bogus appeals. He's in jail--fair and square--where he belongs!
 
The appeal process is just as "fair and square" as the trial process, and just as much a part of the justice system.

Every appeal is in regard to some technicality of the law and/or the trial process itself. There is no *just because he's innocent* appeal. All appeals must be determined to have sufficient legal grounds to be successful.
 
Michael Skakel is appealing his conviction, says the Boston Globe:

HARTFORD, Conn. -- Two families haunted by a 30-year-old murder returned to a Connecticut courtroom Friday, one hopeful that a cousin of the Kennedy clan will be set free and the other angry that a legal technicality could overturn his conviction.

Attorneys for Michael Skakel urged the Connecticut Supreme Court to throw out his murder conviction, arguing that prosecutors waited too long to try him and failed to turn over crucial evidence.

www.boston.com/news/local/Connecticut/articles/2005/01/14/kennedy_cousin_
takes_appeal_to_state_supreme_court

Kathy C
 

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Didn't think there was a statute of limitations on murder!?
 
Pepper said:
Didn't think there was a statute of limitations on murder!?

I think this has to do with the fact that he was a juvenile at the time of the murder and the prosecutors were able to get him tried as an adult. Somehow I believe this is what the appeal is based on.
 
Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel, convicted three years ago of bludgeoning his neighbor to death with a golf club in 1975, will seek a new trial based on a claim by a cousin of basketball star Kobe Bryant that implicates two other people in Martha Moxley's murder.

Skakel's attorneys plan to file the petition for a new trial Monday. The Associated Press on Friday obtained a copy of the legal papers, which have been served on state officials.
http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/new...6,0,878360.story?coll=hc-headlines-local-wire
 
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071107/ap_on_re_us/skakel_appeal

Yet another appeal

HARTFORD, Conn. - Lawyers for Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel, convicted for the 1975 killing of a teenage neighbor, have gone to federal court seeking a new trial.

The petition comes less than two weeks after Skakel was denied a new trial in state Superior Court. He had previously tried to get a new trial by claiming newly discovered evidence.The petition, known as a writ of habeas corpus, claims that Skakel is being held unlawfully.

The federal petition filed Tuesday focuses on six constitutional claims. Among them is that the state Supreme Court rejected Skakel's claim that his prosecution, some 25 years after the crime, was time-barred.
 
Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel on Tuesday again insisted on his innocence in a 1975 Greenwich killing, as he pleaded with a three-judge panel to reduce his 20-years-to-life prison sentence.

Skakel's lawyer, Hubert Santos, argued in Middletown Superior Court that the sentence Skakel received after his 2002 murder conviction in the beating death of Martha Moxley when the two were teen neighbors in wealthy the Greenwich enclave of Belle Haven was excessive. Santos repeated his claim, which has been rejected by other state courts, that Skakel should have been tried in juvenile court, where the maximum sentence for a murder conviction would have been four years.

"Give me a polygraph," Skakel told the judges. "I've passed three sodium pentathol tests. I don't know what else to say."

http://www.ctpost.com/news/article/Skakel-to-judges-I-didn-t-commit-this-crime-2682866.phpcousin
 
Michael's arguments sound hollow now just as they did back in 2002 at his trial. Some people are just a waste of skin.

Mrs. Moxley and her son John have suffered way too much at the hands of this man. Enough already, enough.
 
Skakel got himself arrested because he couldn't keep his mouth shut. He was worried about DNA showing up with the new investigation, so he came up with his tale of masturbating in the tree. Yeah, that was why Skakel's body fluids would have been found on Martha. I love that the Skakel family themselves helped bring Martha Moxley's murderer to justice. :twocents:

He received a very light sentence for what he did. Shame, he couldn't have been sentenced to more time considering the brutal attack that Martha suffered.

Prayers for her family.

jmo
 
Dorthy Moxley was interviewed on Nancy Grace tonight. The episode will repeat at 9pm central time tonight.
 

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