‘Touch DNA’ may reveal who killed Martha Moxley

In a stunning reversal of its 2016 decision, the Connecticut Supreme Court recently concluded, as a lower court did in 2013, that Michael Skakel is entitled to a new trial for the murder of Martha Moxley because his attorney, Michael Sherman, rendered ineffective assistance by failing to present testimony from a credible witness that supported his alibi.

The state now must decide whether to try Skakel again or ask that the charges against him be dismissed. There was and is no forensic evidence pointing to him — no DNA, no fingerprints, no bloodstains on his clothing. There were no eyewitnesses. Before deciding whether to retry him, the state should re-examine all of the evidence in the case and consider whether that evidence points to Skakel or to someone else.

Martha, 15, was murdered on Oct. 30, 1975. Around 9 p.m., she and two friends walked across the street to the Skakel home in the Belle Haven area of Greenwich and sat with Michael, also 15, in the family’s Lincoln listening to music. Around 9:15, Michael’s brother Tommy, 17, joined them. Around 9:30, two of Michael and Tommy’s older brothers and a cousin took the car to go to the cousin’s home in North Greenwich to watch a Monty Python show on television. Michael went with the two older brothers and cousin and returned home around 11:15 p.m. That was confirmed to the police by the brothers and cousin at the time.

Tommy, Martha and her two friends didn’t go to the cousin’s home. Martha’s two friends initially told police they last saw her standing with Tommy in the Skakels’ driveway. Later they said they last saw them pushing and shoving each other and falling to the ground near the swimming pool in the Skakels’ backyard. Years later, Tommy acknowledged he and Martha had engaged in intimate behavior for about 20 minutes before she left to go home.

The Moxleys’ house was across the street from the Skakels’ backyard. As Martha walked up the driveway to her home, she was hit in the head from behind several times with a golf-club that had belonged to Mrs. Skakel — hit so hard her skull was fractured and the club shaft broken — and then stabbed through the neck with the broken-off handle. The Skakel boys often played with golf clubs in their backyard.

Martha’s body was dragged 80 feet and hidden under a large pine tree on the Moxley property and wasn’t found until the next day. Because the autopsy was delayed, the time of death could only be estimated within a range of three to four hours, from 9:30 p.m. to 1 a.m. A forensic pathologist estimated the likely time of death around 10 p.m., which is consistent with reports of unusual noises in the neighborhood around that time, including two dogs in nearby yards that started barking in a loud and agitated manner —so much so that several neighbors went out to see what was going on.

In the 2013 habeas trial, a man who had not testified at the original trial said he was at the Skakel cousin’s home in North Greenwich that evening and talked with Michael and his brothers and cousin while they watched the Monty Python show. The habeas judge concluded Sherman could have easily located the man prior to the trial — the cousin’s sister had referred to him as her “beau” in her grand jury testimony — and called him to testify in support of Michael’s alibi.

But Sherman didn’t do that.

That was one of the reasons the habeas judge threw out the conviction and the reason the Supreme Court did the same in its recent decision.

Who killed Martha Moxley? Given the amount of time that has passed since Oct. 30, 1975, the fact that some individuals involved in the events that evening have died, that the memories of some have faded or changed over the years, and that important evidence — most notably, the handle of the golf club — disappeared in the early stages of the investigation, it may be difficult to answer that question.

Difficult but not impossible, thanks to recent developments in the analysis of DNA. Over the past decade, forensic scientists have developed the ability to collect and analyze “touch DNA” — the DNA in skin cells left on an object when a person touches it. Martha weighed about 115 pounds. Whoever killed her undoubtedly left his “touch DNA” on her clothing where he grasped her as he dragged her to the pine tree.

Is the “touch DNA” of the killer still on the clothing Martha wore that evening? We don’t know. But if it is, we may yet find out who killed Martha Moxley.

Skakel

Moxley