Conviction

Summary

From award-winning journalist Leonard Levitt, the Edgar Award-nominated story of his friendship with the lead detective on the Martha Moxley case, and how two unlikely heroes found justice against staggering odds. On October 30, 1975, fifteen-year-old Martha Moxley was brutally murdered in her backyard on the way home from the house of her Greenwich, Connecticut, neighbors Tommy and Michael Skakel. Her murder made national headlines. But for years no one was arrested, despite troubling clues pointing to the Skakels, a rich and powerful family related to the Kennedys. Enter Leonard Levitt. When two newspapers asked Levitt to look into the murder Levitt soon uncovered groundbreaking information about what had happened that night and subsequently, in the police investigation. But for years, Levitt's superiors mysteriously refused to publish the stories. Convinced that the Moxley family deserved peace and closure at last, Levitt refused to give up. Finally, after Levitt's first article appeared, the case was reopened. Frank Garr, a seasoned Greenwich detective, was appointed investigator on the Moxley case. He pursued unexplored leads and became increasingly convinced that for over a decade, his colleagues had been pursuing the wrong suspects. At first mistrustful of one another, Levitt and Garr became friends, encouraging each other in their quest for the truth as the obstacles against them piled up. In 2002, more than twenty-five years after Moxley's death, thanks largely to Garr's work, Michael Skakel was convicted of the murder. Now, for the first time, Leonard Levitt tells the amazing true story of Garr's fight to solve the case and of how their friendship with each other, and with Martha Moxley's mother, Dorthy, sustained them over the years. A riveting, suspenseful drama that unfolds like a mystery novel, this incredible memoir also reveals how a police officer and a reporter refused to give up, and of how they helped justice to prevail, against all odds.

Foreword

Acknowledgments

Introduction

xiii

PART I

1. East Coast O.J.

(6)

2. My Second Half

(10)

3. "Then, the Sadness Came"

(16)

4. Doing Things by the Rules

(14)

5. "I Believe I Know Who Killed Martha Moxley but I Cannot Prove It"

(11)

6. The Case File

(6)

7. Our Mutual Tragedy

(14)

8. Poisoning the Well

(15)

PART II

9. "They Didn't Bungle, Botch, or 'Tread Lightly'"

(9)

10. Leads, Lies, and Jeans

104

(14)

11. In Love with the Poly

118

(15)

PART III

12. The Caller

133

(15)

13. Sitting on a Bombshell

148

(6)

14. The Lion and the Crocodile

154

(17)

15. The Confession

171

(11)

16. "The Truth Remains the Same but a Lie Always Changes"

182

(15)

PART IV

17. The Stars and the Hacks

197

(9)

18. "Nobody Will Believe You"

206

(9)

19. The Face of the Killer

215

(16)

PART V

20. Moment of Triumph

231

(4)

21. "I'm a Kennedy. I'm Going to Get Away with Murder"

235

(6)

22. "Frank Garr Is the Reason We Are All Here"

241

(14)

23. "It's Michael. It Can't Be Anyone Else. It's Him"

255

(17)

24. "You and I Will Still Be There"

272

(15)

List of Names

287

(4)

Index

291

Supplemental Materials

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Excerpts

Conviction
Solving the Moxley Murder: A Reporter and Detective's Twenty-Year Search for Justice

Chapter One

East Coast O.J.

NORWALK, CONNECTICUT
June 2002

I never thought Michael would be convicted.

I only hoped for Frank's sake the jury would deliberate longer thanthe few hours it had in the O. J. Simpson case. That way Frank wouldn'tbe embarrassed.

This was East Coast O.J., involving one of America's richest familieswith a bloodline to the Kennedys, and the case was all Frank's. He hadfound all the witnesses. Many hadn't wanted to testify. Frank Garr, theyrelated, had pursued, cajoled, harassed, or threatened them.

Walking about the courtroom in his black pinstriped suit with his airof professional gravitas, Frank reminded me of an undertaker. His hair -- all white and formerly worn in a ponytail -- curled up the back of hisneck. While working as a narcotics detective two decades before, he hadtaken an acting course in Manhattan. Like all actors, there was a touch ofvanity to his appearance.

As Michael's trial begins, Frank is fifty-seven years old, a twenty-seven-year veteran of the Greenwich, Connecticut, police department.For the past seven years, he has been an inspector with the Fairfield County state's attorney's office. He has investigated the Moxley murderfor eleven years and come to know it like no one else. He understandsMichael better than Michael's own family and probably better than hisnumerous psychiatrists.

Frank also knows the Skakel family. Despite the image of forthrightnessand generosity they present to the world, Frank says they have nomorals or conscience. He calls them habitual liars and says their loyalty isonly to each other.

Frank has no more regard for their friends, neighbors, and attorneys-- even their family priest. All of them, he says, knew about Michaelbut looked away.

"Genetic hedonism: the desire for immediate pleasure or instantgratification." That was the term for the Skakels coined by one of thosepsychiatrists, Dr. Stanley Lesse. He had been hired by Rushton SkakelSr. the year after the murder when Rushton realized his son Tommy wasa suspect.

But "genetic hedonism" falls short of describing them. Tom Sheridan,the Skakel family lawyer, would later offer his own term for them -- "histrionic sociopaths."

"Their interest is only self-interest," Sheridan says. "They lack empathyfor anyone but themselves." And after the Skakels turned againsthim -- as they did to virtually everyone they used to protect them in theMoxley case -- Sheridan added, "And if you disagree with them, you aretheir enemy."

And here they all are, the Skakels and their supporters, filling the farright section of the courtroom in a calculated display of familial unity.They are a clannish crowd, unbowed and unrepentant. Both inside andoutside the courtroom, they speak only to each other. They dress casuallyas only the rich can, in khaki pants, sports jackets, and loafers. The youngestbrother Stephen wears alligator cowboy boots. They begin everymorning with smiles and handshakes. Every afternoon they lunch togetherat the Ash Creek Saloon a few blocks away.

Rush Jr., the eldest of the seven children, has flown in from Bogota,Colombia. David, the second youngest, has come from Oregon. Their cousin, Bobby Kennedy Jr., appears unannounced late in the trial. He'dattended Michael's first court hearing in nearby Stamford two years beforebut has not been seen since.

Tommy -- Michael's older brother, boyhood rival, and tormentor -- also turns up, if only for a day. He is in his mid-forties now, balding andwearing glasses. Like Michael, he has admitted lying to the police abouthis whereabouts the night of the murder.

The family matriarch is Ann McCooey, Michael's aunt, Rushton'ssister, known as Big Ann. A stout woman with bleached blonde hair, BigAnn sits in the same seat in the first row every day of the trial, next to herdaughter, whose name is also Ann. During the trial, Michael is said to bestaying with Big Ann, as his wife Margo -- Tom Sheridan's niece -- has begundivorce proceedings. The strain from his murder charge has beentoo much for them.

And there at the center is Michael. Now forty-one years old, portlyand blowzy with thinning hair and a florid face, he does not or cannotclose his shirt's top button beneath his tie. Each morning before testimonybegins, he stands in the courtroom well, accepting his family'schucks of support, chatting with his lawyers and his bodyguard, a huge,bald black man. The bodyguard is not merely Michael's protector. He ishis silencer. Michael can't keep his mouth shut.

Two years before at his first court appearance in Stamford, he hadlurched from the defense table and made for Martha's mother Dorthy,seated in the first row of spectators. His voice loud enough to make thesix o'clock news and even the next day's New York Times, he had blurted,"Dorthy, I feel your pain. But you've got the wrong guy."

She had turned to me in tears. Michael had sounded so aggressive, soarrogant. He'd presumed he could address her by her first name, asthough they were equals. After twenty years, I still called her Mrs. Moxley.

During a break in that day's testimony, Frank caught my eye. "Didyou notice Michael staring at me?" he asked. "Watch him when we goback. He tries to stare me down."

Better than anyone, Frank knows Michael can't control himself. He'sblabbed about Martha's murder for years, releasing thoughts that weighed upon him, like steam escaping from a pressure cooker. Indeed, itwas Michael's own words -- confided to friends, then to private investigators,and to the ghostwriter of his unpublished autobiography -- that ledto his arrest.

I am one of nearly 100 reporters who have covered every day ofMichael's month-long trial here in Norwalk. Unseen by the rest of them,a second drama is occurring.

I notice that Frank does not sit at the table with the prosecutionteam ...

Conviction
Solving the Moxley Murder: A Reporter and Detective's Twenty-Year Search for Justice. Copyright © by Leonard Levitt. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold.

Excerpted from Conviction: Solving the Moxley Murder: A Reporter and a Detective's Twenty-Year Search for Justice by Leonard Levitt
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