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Michael Skakel — the Kennedy cousin who spent more than a decade in prison for the 1975 murder of his teenage Connecticut neighbor before he was sprung on procedural grounds — is suing the town of Greenwich and its lead police investigator over claims he was locked behind bars in a targeted attack. The lawsuit claims investigators pinned the slaying on Skakel for their own personal and financial gain. Skakel, a nephew of Robert F. Kennedy’s widow, Ethel Kennedy, was convicted of 15-year-old Martha Moxley’s murder in 2002 and sentenced to 20 years to life in prison, but was released...

Political activist Robert Kennedy Jr. warned that a "society in fear" due to the COVID-19 pandemic could result in the "complete obliteration of critical thinking." Kennedy, who spoke at the Ron Paul Institute's conference, noted that only a small fraction of the individuals comprising the CDC's COVID-19 death total died primarily from COVID-19. "Among 378,048 death certificates from 2020 listing COVID-19 as a cause of death, 5.5% listed COVID-19 without codes for any other conditions," according to the CDC. "The people who died, 96% of them, had almost 400 reasons that might have killed them," Kennedy said during a session...

A curfew in Philadelphia tonight from 9pm to 6am. Streets in the downtown area closed. Members of the Pennsylvania National Guard deployed... A federal judge in Portland granting a preliminary injunction saying that federal officers denied First Amendment rights to peaceful protesters... Walmart removing firearms and ammunition from display floors...Today Walmart reversing course... The country with the highest coronavirus infection rate in Europe moving to a national lockdown. Belgium shutting down... In Canada Winnipeg the largest city in Manitoba moving to a Code Red coronavirus lockdown... An earthquake measuring 7.0 struck off the coast of Turkey today... The current UK...

Sixteen months ago, the Connecticut Supreme Court reinstated the conviction, but then reversed itself on Friday and granted Skakel a new trial. In an interview with "Today" on Monday, attorney Michael Fitzpatrick said defense

HARTFORD, Conn. (WTNH) - The Connecticut Supreme Court has overturned the 1975 murder conviction of Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel. The Hartford Courant reports that the Connecticut Supreme Court voted 4-3 that Skakel's trial lawyer was so ineffective, that his right to a fair trial was violated. Skakel was convicted in the murder of his friend, Martha Moxley, when the two were neighbors in Greenwich. Skakel has been free since late 2013 while the court considered this latest appeal. He is expected to remain free unless state prosecutors make what many lawyers predict would be an unlikely decision to retry him...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court announced Monday that it is leaving in place a decision that vacated a murder conviction against Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel. Skakel was convicted in 2002 of the 1975 bludgeoning death of Martha Moxley, a 15-year-old who lived across the street from the Skakel family in Greenwich, Connecticut, and whose body was found in her family’s backyard. Both Skakel and Moxley were 15 at the time of her death. The high court’s refusal to hear the case means that a 2018 decision by Connecticut’s highest court throwing out Skakel’s conviction will stand. Connecticut’s highest court...

(CNN)Michael Skakel could be headed back to prison after the Connecticut Supreme Court on Friday reinstated his conviction in the 1975 murder of a 15-year-old neighbor. Skakel, the 56-year-old nephew of Robert and Ethel Kennedy, had spent more than a decade in prison for the killing of Martha Moxley until a judge in 2013 decided he did not receive adequate representation in his trial and ordered a new one. On Friday, after Skakel had been free for three years, the state's high court overruled the decision. "Because we conclude that the petitioner's trial counsel rendered constitutionally adequate representation, we reverse...

HARTFORD, Conn. — A divided Connecticut Supreme Court Friday reinstated the murder conviction of Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel, rejecting a Superior Court judge’s finding that Skakel’s trial was tainted by ineffective lawyering and setting the stage for Skakel’s return to prison after three years of freedom. “Because we conclude that the petitioner’s trial counsel rendered constitutionally adequate representation, we reverse the judgment” of the lower court, a 4-3 majority of the Supreme Court wrote in a decision released Friday afternoon. Skakel was convicted in 2002 in the bludgeoning death 27 years earlier of Greenwich neighbor Martha Moxley, when she and...

On the 39th anniversary of the 1975 slaying of Greenwich teenager Martha Moxley, the Kennedy scion accused of her murder is set to settle a slander lawsuit against television host Nancy Grace. In a stipulation of settlement filed in U.S. District Court in Hartford on Wednesday, legal counsel for Michael Skakel agreed to drop his case against the HLN pundit and fellow legal commentator Beth Karas for comments they made in a 2012 broadcast about DNA evidence near the scene of the crime. HLN parent companies Time Warner and Turner Broadcasting System were also named in the defamation suit and...

Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel was granted a new trial on Wednesday by a Connecticut judge who ruled his attorney failed to adequately represent him when he was convicted in 2002 of killing his neighbor in 1975. The ruling by Judge Thomas Bishop marked a dramatic reversal after years of unsuccessful appeals by Skakel, the 52-year-old nephew of Robert F. Kennedy’s widow, Ethel Kennedy. Skakel is serving 20 years to life. … Skakel argued his trial attorney, Michael Sherman, was negligent in defending him when he was convicted in the golf club bludgeoning of Martha Moxley when they were 15 in...

MIDDLETOWN, Conn. (AP) — Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel on Tuesday again insisted on his innocence in a 1975 killing, as he pleaded with a three-judge panel to reduce his prison sentence of 20 years to life. 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 Greenwich 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...

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) -- Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel lost his bid for a new trial in the 1975 slaying of his 15-year-old neighbor when the state Supreme Court on Monday rejected his appeal that cited a claim implicating two other men. The court ruled 4-1 against Skakel's request. Skakel - a nephew of Robert Kennedy's widow, Ethel - was sentenced to 20 years to life in prison in 2002 for fatally beating Martha Moxley with a golf club in 1975 in a wealthy Connecticut suburb

A man who implicated two friends in the 1975 murder that sent Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel to prison has refused to testify, prompting a prosecutor to accuse him of making up the account. Gitano (Tony) Bryant invoked his constitutional right against self-incrimination at his deposition recently in Miami and does not plan to testify at hearings on whether Skakel deserves a new trial, said Joel Denaro, his lawyer. "What it strongly suggests to us is that Mr. Bryant's story is a fabrication and he is seeking to avoid testifying under oath for that reason," prosecutor Jonathan Benedict said. Skakel's lawyers...

A former U.S. solicitor general will help Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel appeal his murder conviction to the U.S. Supreme Court, saying Monday the case will focus on when the charges were filed. Theodore B. Olson has argued 43 cases before the nation's highest court, including representing George W. Bush in the disputed presidential race of 2000. Skakel, 45, is serving a sentence of 20 years to life for his 2002 conviction in the 1975 beating death of his Greenwich neighbor, Martha Moxley, when the two were teenagers. Skakel appealed his conviction to the Connecticut Supreme Court last year, arguing among...

BOSTON (Reuters) - Kennedy relative Michael Skakel will appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court in a bid to overturn his conviction in the 1975 murder of his 15-year-old neighbor Martha Moxley, his lawyer said on Tuesday. ADVERTISEMENT Skakel, now 45, was convicted in 2002 of bludgeoning Moxley to death with one of his mother's golf clubs and was sentenced to 20 years to life in prison. In January, Skakel, 15 at the time of the murder, lost an appeal of that decision to the Connecticut Supreme Court. Skakel's lawyers filed a motion on February 14 asking the court to review...

NEW HAVEN, Conn. -- The 1975 murder of Martha Moxley set in motion more than a quarter century of grief and intrigue as the attractive teen's family waited for justice while two Kennedy cousins lived under a cloud of suspicion. The long delay in an arrest fueled suspicions of a powerful cover-up in a wealthy Connecticut town. Authorities ultimately charged one of the cousins, Michael Skakel, with bludgeoning Moxley with a golf club and accused his wealthy family of a cover-up to thwart his prosecution during a trial that led to his conviction in 2002. Now Skakel says he should...

VERO BEACH, Fla. (AP) — The body of a local socialite once related by marriage to the Kennedy family was found in a sunken car, authorities said. Police do not suspect foul play in the death of 65-year-old Hope Sheridan, who was last seen March 8. Family members in Windham, N.Y., reported her missing on March 11. Sheridan is the ex-mother-in-law of Michael Skakel, a cousin of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Skakel, 42, is serving 20 years to life in prison for the beating death of his Greenwich, Conn., neighbor, Martha Moxley, in 1975. Divers found Sheridan's car Monday afternoon...

The war of words between Bobby Kennedy Jr. and Vanity Fair scribe Dominick Dunne rages on and now Dunne is accusing Kennedy of inaccuracies, distortions, Monday-morning quarterbacking - and worse - in the wake of Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel's murder conviction. In case you missed it, Kennedy wrote an 18-page, 14,000-word defense of his beleaguered kin in the Atlantic Monthly last month, accusing Dunne and O.J. Simpson case detective Mark Fuhrman of leading a media lynch mob that helped convict an innocent man. Dunne fires back in the latest issue of VF, on the stands today, saying the long-winded diatribe...

Rushton Skakel Sr.: In-law of Kennedys, father of killer 01/05/2003 Associated Press STAMFORD, Conn. - Rushton Skakel Sr., brother of Ethel Kennedy and father of Michael Skakel - who was convicted last year of killing a teenage neighbor in 1975 - died Thursday at age 79. Mr. Skakel died in Hobe Sound, Fla., after a long battle with a brain illness, his lawyer, Emanuel Margolis, said Saturday. Relatives traveled to Florida to make arrangements for a service there Saturday, Mr. Margolis said. Michael Skakel's trial lawyer, Michael Sherman, said: "In the four years that I've had contact with him,...

Words don't come easy, Your Honor. This whole process has been something that has been so surreal. I have heard a lot of my family today. I have heard from both sides. I feel for both sides. I have heard a lot of things that -- a lot of people said a lot of nice things about me. The prosecution says that my life started over as a 30-year-old in Curry College. The fact of the matter is, I owe everything to the God of my understanding, my savior Jesus Christ. And I say that not lightly. I say that...