This is deeply disturbing.
My book about the Moxley murder case should be out at around the same time as this one: middle of July.
In my book, I say almost everything the opposite of what RFK Jr. says. My heros are his villains. His heros are vile villains. And that troubles me.
The thing is, RFK Jr. has a horse in the race, and I don’t. Michael Skakel is his effing cousin. I don’t know Michael Skakel from the man in the moon.
I approached my book with a clear head. No side-taking. Just the facts as I uncovered them in over a year of research and another six months of writing. And what I uncovered from reading over 30 books (I own them all. Ask my wife, she says their cluttering our house), and hundreds of newspaper and magazine articles, is that Michael Skakel is as guilty as sin. There is no other possible conclusion, unless Michael Skakel is your cousin, and you’re a Kennedy.
Bill O’Reilly should get his head out of his butt. I know he’s a Kennedy groupie. Most Irish Catholics are. (I bet his family had a framed picture of JFK over the mantlepiece in their home on Levittown, L.I. – We had Sinatra 🙂 )
But saying Michael Skakel is innocent of the murder of Martha Moxley is like saying Judas didn’t betray Jesus. It’s like saying the Japanese didn’t bomb Pearl Harbor. It’s like saying Sinatra couldn’t hold a tune.
But I’m sure RFK is going to try.
He’s got the money. He’s got the name.
But I have the truth.
That’s something the KennedyFamily has avoided since Papa Joe Kennedy was partners with Al Capone and Frank Costello during Prohibition.
By Mark Shanahan GLOBE STAFF JUNE 17, 2016
The cover of author Larry Tye’s new book about Robert F. Kennedy.
The cover of author Larry Tye’s new book about Robert F. Kennedy.
You could fill a small library with all the books written about the Kennedys. And still they keep coming. Clear shelf space for two more.
Former Boston Globe reporter Larry Tye has written a standard bio of Robert F. Kennedy, called “Bobby Kennedy: The Making of a Liberal Icon,” that drops in early July. And Robert F. Kennedy Jr. checks in with “Framed: Why Michael Skakel Spent over a Decade in Prison for a Murder He Didn’t Commit,” a book whose publisher at least believes is the “definitive” account of the bizarre case involving the Kennedy cousin.
Tye, whose previous bios include “Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend” and “Superman: The High-Flying History of America’s Most Enduring Hero,” says Bobby Kennedy was a transformative political figure whose evolution is neither well understood nor sufficiently appreciated.
“His story gives us hope that politicians can grow and change,” says Tye. “Maybe even Donald Trump.”
That’s not to say Kennedy and Trump have a lot in common. They don’t. For example, Tye points out that unlike the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, who last week revoked the Washington Post’s credentials to cover his campaign, Kennedy had an unusually close relationship with the political media.
“He didn’t duck and cover like Hillary [Clinton] does, and he didn’t trash and banish the way Trump does,” says Tye, whose bio also sheds light on RFK’s relationship with Senator Joseph McCarthy and Kennedy’s role in the Cuban Missile Crisis.
The author says he interviewed over 400 people, many of whom have since died.
“Bobby would have turned 90 this year,” says Tye. “This is the last chance to get to these people so they can tell their story.”
The book about Skakel, meanwhile, has been something of a secret. We tried to get our hands on a copy, but Skyhorse Publishing asked us to sign a non-disclosure agreement, which would prevent us from writing about the book before it comes out July 12. (The publisher also has given “Today” and “Dateline” the exclusive.)
What we know is that RFK Jr. doesn’t believe that Skakel did what, in 2002, he was convicted of doing: Killing 15-year-old Martha Moxley in Greenwich, Conn., in 1975. Skakel, whose aunt is RFK’s widow, Ethel Skakel Kennedy, was sentenced to 20 years to life, but in 2013 a judge granted him a new trial and released him on $1.2 million bail.
The new book, which is blurbed by Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly — “Americans interested in justice should be captivated by this book” — asserts that Skakel was “railroaded” by “a crooked cop,” “mendacious writers,” a “treacherous family lawyer,” a “narcissistic defense attorney,” a “craven prosecutor gone rogue,” and a whole lot of “perjuring witnesses.”
So, if not Skakel, who committed the murder? Robert F. Kennedy Jr. offers his own theory, which no doubt will lead to even more books.
Joe Bruno on the Mob 