The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Skakel case heads to Supreme Court
GREENWICH — Connecticut state prosecutors are turning to the U.S. Supreme Court in their efforts to reinstate the murder conviction against Michael Skakel in the stabbing death of a Greenwich teenager in 1975.
In a petition filed Thursday morning, state prosecutors made their case to the court in Washington, D.C., to overturn the decision by the Connecticut Supreme Court. The state’s highest court in May vacated the murder conviction on the grounds that Skakel, now 57, did not receive a fair trial due to an inadequate defense by his lawyer — a reversal of its own 2016 decision after the court’s makeup changed.
Defense lawyers for Skakel have maintained that he did not receive a fair trial when he was convicted in 2002 for the 1975 murder of Martha Moxley in Greenwich due to mistakes made by his original defense lawyer, Michael Sherman. They contend that Sherman failed to bring a possible alibi witness to the stand, which they say would have gained Skakel an acquittal, among other missteps.
But the argument by state prosecutors filed Thursday claims that Skakel, a nephew of Ethel and Robert F. Kennedy, did indeed receive a fair trial. They contend that the overall defense was a sound one.
“The well-to-do defendant was represented by a highly skilled and experienced defense attorney, who was himself aided by a team of other attorneys. Together, they utilized resources that the vast majority of criminal defendants can only dream of accessing,” wrote the petitioners, Chief State’s Attorney Kevin T. Kane and Senior Assistant State’s Attorney James A. Killen. “They hired three sets of investigators and consulted with a number of experts in various fields, including many legal experts who are among the most distinguished criminal defense attorneys in the state, if not the nation.”
The state prosecutors also contend that the possible alibi witness, Dennis Ossorio, who said he had watched television with Skakel on the night of the murder, was not as crucial to the case as Skakel’s defenders have maintained. Ossorio’s version of events, more than 40 years after the night in question, “even if credited, by no means exonerated the defendant,” the state’s attorneys said.
The state prosecutors have cited a possible timeline of the murder that would allow for the killing to have taken place later in the night, making Ossorio’s testimony far from exonerating.
The petition states that the Skakel case is important for the interpretation of the Sixth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, the right to a fair trial, and its application to a 1984 court case, Strickland v. Washington. That decision established a legal concept that a right to a fair trial is violated if the legal defense is inadequate or incompetent.
The state’s attorneys are seeking a review from the Supreme Court on whether the “overall performance” of a legal defense should be considered in evaluating whether a defendant received fair trial. They maintain that should be the standard, not “the effect of the single error on the outcome of the trial.”
According to Kane and Killen, “confusion and outright disagreement continue to plague our state and federal courts” on the issue of what makes an effective legal defense, so the Supreme Court’s intervention was warranted.
“A claim of ineffective assistance of counsel is a powerful weapon in the arsenal of a disappointed litigant seeking to challenge his or her criminal conviction,” the state lawyers conclude.
The state’s attorneys are looking for a response from the highest court in its next session. Skakel’s lawyers will also file a rebuttal of the state’s petition.
Skakel’s defense team referred a request for comment to a Washington, D.C., lawyer, Roman Martinez, who said only that it was under review.
A decision could come this fall. If the Supreme Court agrees to hear the case, oral arguments could be held early next year.
The Supreme Court receives thousands of petitions a year — but reviews only a few hundred.
Skakel served more than 11 years in prison on the murder conviction. He was released in 2013 on the grounds of incompetent legal counsel, commencing rounds of back-and-forth litigation over the issue. The justice who wrote the 2016 majority decision determining Skakel had a fair trial, Peter Zarella, left the court shortly afterward, and a new justice, Gregory D’Auria, voted with the majority in May to vacate the conviction.
Martha Moxley, a 15year-old Greenwich High School sophomore, was beaten to death with a golf club near her home in the wealthy private enclave of Belle Haven on the night before Halloween in 1975.
Skakel is currently living in Westchester County, N.Y., his legal team said.