Posted on 03/29/2018 7:42:17 AM PDT by MarvinStinson
Mary Jo Kopechne had been dead for several months when her parents began to have serious questions about what really happened the night of July 18, 1969.
At first, Gwen and Joe Kopechne had believed Senator Ted Kennedy’s account of that evening. “They trusted him,” says Mary Jo’s aunt, Georgetta Potoski, 75. “They loved the Kennedys. But later on, they started to question what happened.”
Ted Kennedy could never escape the unanswered questions about his 10-hour delay in reporting the accident to Edgartown police.
“The longer it went on, more and more inconsistencies were discovered and he wasn’t telling Gwen and Joe anything,” says Potoski ,the sister of Gwen Kopechne. “Gwen and Joe never had the last hours of their daughter’s life explained to them.”
Now, 49 years after Mary Jo’s death, a new movie Chappaquiddick explores what happened that night and in the week that followed, when Kennedy pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of an accident.
Potoski and her son William Nelson, 46, hope the film may prompt someone to come forward with new information— and give them the answers they never got from Senator Kennedy. “The truth has never really come out,” says Nelson. “The story has never been put to rest.”
The film has not been well-received by the Kennedy camp.
Still, Potoski and her family hope that Mary Jo’s story being told on screen will result in more people learning that she was much more than just a “blonde secretary,” as she was often referred to at the time.
Potoski and Nelson have written a book, Our Mary Jo, about her life and have also launched a scholarship in her name at Potoski’s alma mater, Misericordia College (now Misericordia University), to be given out for the first time this year.
(Excerpt) Read more at people.com ...
circlecity wrote: “I think the essential details are pretty well know by now. Teddy was blitzed drunk and drove a car off a bridge.”
What makes you so certain Teddy drove the car off the bridge? There is a theory that he was “parked” with Mary Joe when a cop came by. Teddy slipped out of the car and told MJ to drive the car into town and meet him at the hotel. MJ, unfamiliar with the road, drove off the bridge. Teddy didn’t even realize what happened until the next day. BTW, this still means Teddy was responsible for the death.
Well done!
The Press.
It is great that this movie has been made. There is no statute of limitations on negligent homicide. As an Irish guy from Boston, the Kennedys were an embarrassment. Worse were the hundreds of thousands that voted for Ted despite Chappaquicick. I guess that being Irish, Catholic, and part of the family that had experienced tragedy outweighed what Ted did. Howie Carr (conservative Boston talk show host for past 25 years) wrote a book last year detailing the incredibly dysfunctional history of the Kennedys - Kennedy Babylon. https://www.amazon.com/Kennedy-Babylon-Century-Scandal-Depravity/dp/0986193305/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1522336177&sr=8-1&keywords=kennedy+babylon
It is great that this movie has been made. There is no statute of limitations on negligent homicide. As an Irish guy from Boston, the Kennedys were an embarrassment. Worse were the hundreds of thousands that voted for Ted despite Chappaquicick. I guess that being Irish, Catholic, and part of the family that had experienced tragedy outweighed what Ted did. Howie Carr (conservative Boston talk show host for past 25 years) wrote a book last year detailing the incredibly dysfunctional history of the Kennedys - Kennedy Babylon. https://www.amazon.com/Kennedy-Babylon-Century-Scandal-Depravity/dp/0986193305/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1522336177&sr=8-1&keywords=kennedy+babylon
I’ve been reading Senatorial Privilege and also watching some of the documentaries on utube.
Clearly, the real story hasn’t been told. Kennedy’s statement the day after the accident and then the second one two weeks later are so impossible to be believed that it’s incredible the media didn’t hammer him.
I doubt that the guy was even in the car. Don’t know how he got back to his hotel room. He said he swam back. No way.
A young woman’s life was prematurely lost that night, and the children and life she might have had never occurred. Kennedy went on to wreak havoc in America, leaving a legacy which we will be lucky to survive as a nation. I personally believe that to some extent he tried to assuage whatever guilt he felt by passing legislation that had social justice implications - but that ultimately proved to be destructive.
If he wanted to make amends for that event, I think he could have done a much better job by leaving the limelight, starting a charitable foundation for which he would get no credit, and perhaps working to stop alcohol abuse and drunk driving.
He, however, stayed firmly in the limelight, ran for the Presidency, and by many accounts did not reform his life.
To me, with clear exceptions, the Kennedy family has a legacy of many failures - despite the financial resources and fame they’ve enjoyed. The family has also caused a significant amount of pain to many whose paths crossed with theirs.
“Same with Scalia by the way.”
The fact that ‘they’ did this with virtually no accountability is appalling to me.
we’re to believe that Judge Scalia died from natural causes? I don’t buy it.
Months after his death, I saw a video clip of a Chelsea Clinton speech and she said “...and now that Scalia’s out of the way...”
Is there a shred of evidence to back that up? Certainly that was not what others at the party Ted had just left reported.
Have you been living under a rock?
Joe Kennedy had bought and paid for the entire local and state police force. It must have cost him a lot of dough...............
“He said he swam back. No way.”
He could have-—he was a strong swimmer.
.
“Teddy didn’t even realize what happened until the next day.”
Garbage.
That evening after the accident he tried to get several lawyers back at the compound to lie for him and say he was not in the car.
They all refused, telling him, “You just said you were in the car. We’re not going to risk our legal careers for you.”
ABCBSNBCNYTLATWAPO.....................
Which was it, a big payoff with a non-disclosure agreement, or a "nice rest of the family you've got there...it would be a shame if something happened to them"?
Verified by lawyers back at the compund who said Kennedy tried to get them to lie for him.
You are clueless on this topic.
Yes, they got an “offer they couldn’t refuse”.
Well done. Lol
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