Martha Speaks

Summary

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Dead Certain: The Martha Moxley Murder

Episode: “Martha Speaks” – January 13, 2026

Host: Andrew Goldman (NBC News Studios)
Summary Prepared For: Listeners seeking a detailed yet accessible episode overview

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Main Theme & Purpose

In “Martha Speaks,” investigative journalist Andrew Goldman uses Martha Moxley’s own teenage diary—the only real chronicle of her inner world—to deeply re-examine the established narratives about the 1975 murder. The episode explores whether overlooked or reinterpreted diary entries, and reevaluated witness accounts, might provide new insight into who killed Martha in her privileged Greenwich neighborhood. Goldman unpacks the alibis, story changes, and potential motives surrounding two of the most prominent men in Martha’s orbit: Tommy Skakel (neighbor, onetime suspect) and Peter Zaluka (her boyfriend).

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Power and Privacy of Martha’s Diary (01:32–04:04)

• Goldman introduces Martha’s diary as voiced by an actor, noting its emotional weight and ethical complexity.
• Diaries were a secret, sacred refuge for teen girls—a “non-judgmental mother confessor.”
• Reading Martha’s private adolescence is “a touch uncomfortable” (Andrew Goldman, 01:59), but necessary to provide her a voice and expose overlooked details vital to the murder investigation.

2. Martha’s Social Circle & Skakel Connections (05:25–08:06)

• Martha’s fall 1975 diary entries detail her growing involvement with the Skakel siblings:
  • “The usual in the mobile home” = drinking and smoking in the Skakels’ driveway.
  • Jackie, Mooge (best friend Margie Walker), recounted as key companions.
• Tommy Skakel, older than Martha, was “needed as a driver,” with access to the family’s “Love Mobile.”
  • Tommy is described as “a little volatile… crazy… used swear words none of us had heard before” (Margie Walker, 06:13).
  • Michael and Jackie were nudged as an encouraged couple, but “can’t say they were really romantic.”

3. Mischief Night Timeline and Alibi Breakdown (08:06–12:41)

• On the night of Martha's murder, flirtation with Tommy was observed just before Martha vanished.
• Tommy’s police interviews:
  • Claimed to see Martha leave toward her home at 9:30; went upstairs for “homework.”
  • This “homework” alibi unraveled when checked with his teacher—no Lincoln report due (10:20).
• Neighborhood dogs began barking at 9:50pm; Dorothy Moxley later heard voices outside around 10pm—likely the murder window.
• Skakel tutor Ken Littleton reported Tommy was not in his bedroom at 9:45, later reappearing at 10:15 to watch a movie.

4. Initial Investigation & Questionable Clearance of Tommy (11:45–13:28)

• Martha’s diary described increasing flirtation and some sexual tension with Tommy.
• Tommy consistently passed polygraphs, maintained calm under intensive questioning, and, after two weeks in a psychiatric ward—where he was even administered “truth serum”—stuck to his story: never saw Martha again after 9:30.

5. Tommy Skakel’s Changed Story—The Sutton Investigation Bombshell (17:44–26:39)

• In the early 1990s, the Skakel family’s private detectives (Sutton Associates) re-interviewed Tommy. Under pressure, he finally admitted a very different sequence:
  • Claimed a 20-minute sexual encounter with Martha on the lawn, ending around 9:50pm—near the murder time.
  • “They began an extended 20 minute kissing and fondling session, which... culminated in orgasm… Martha says goodnight” (21:05).
• Tommy’s story change was theorized by some (incl. Jim Murphy) as pre-emptive cover if his DNA ever turned up via new forensic tech (22:52).
• Others (Len Levitt) speculated the change was to avoid admitting sexual activity to his ultraconservative father, not police.
• After this confession, Tommy’s lawyer cut off further interviews. The story eventually leaked, shifting public and police suspicion back onto Tommy.

“Suddenly was with Martha that evening. Hadn't told the police about it...to be more in line with...a sexual encounter.”
— Manny Margolis (Tommy’s lawyer), 21:47

6. Forensics, Timeline Flaws, and Family Dynamics (26:39–37:28)

• Despite new suspicion, Tommy maintained he never killed Martha, and there was no physical evidence tying him to the crime.

• The murder’s timeline remains problematic for theories involving Tommy due to his presence in the house for a prolonged movie viewing soon after.

• Notably, even estranged brother Michael Skakel never accused Tommy:

  “Honestly, I didn't think my brother Tommy did it. I just don't...for some reason, I don't think so.”
  — Michael Skakel, 39:10

• The Skakel siblings displayed remarkable lack of communication about Martha’s death:

  “How can you go so many years and never ask your brother what happened, details about the evening?”
  — Margie Walker, 40:32

7. Martha’s Relationship with Peter Zaluka: Motive for Jealousy? (44:14–50:18)

• Martha’s summer-fall 1975 romance with Peter Zaluka grew sour, marked by moodiness and verbal abuse.
• He sometimes insulted her; their relationship was tumultuous and, at times, reportedly violent or mean (46:48–47:09).
• On the night of the murder, Peter, then Martha’s boyfriend, claimed a tight alibi—home with his mother, who vouched for him.
• However, details in his alibi interviews changed over the years; his mother was never separated from him during police questioning.

8. Diary Clues: The Peter Theft & Possible Motive (54:20–56:47)

• Weeks before the murder, Peter stole Martha’s diary (or attempted to), possibly glimpsing entries about flirting with other boys:

  “As you’ve probably noticed, you are a little mutilated because Peter…tried to read you...I could have killed him.”
  — Martha’s diary entry, 54:39

• Hypothetical: What if Peter, jealous or humiliated, witnessed Martha’s intimacy with Tommy and attacked her in a rage?

• Law enforcement never closely scrutinized Peter, accepting his mother’s account as definitive.

9. Aftermath: Peter and Tommy’s Later Lives & Lingering Uncertainty (59:17–61:36)

• Peter Zaluka’s life unraveled after Martha’s death: legal troubles, substance abuse, early death at 51.
• His sister ultimately claimed, “he did not kill Martha,” but acknowledged the murder’s profound effect on him.

10. Lack of Physical Evidence—the Unsolved Mystery (61:36–62:59)

• No forensic evidence connects Tommy or Peter to Martha’s murder.
• A few ambiguous clues exist (unidentified hairs, a Belhaven maid’s report of blood in a house), with promises of further revelations in the final episode.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments (With Timestamps)

• On reading Martha’s diary:
  “At 53, do I feel a touch uncomfortable reading the multicolored, loopy scrawls of a 15-year-old girl’s diary? I do. But...if I am violating her privacy, I’m far from the first to do so.”
  — Andrew Goldman, [01:59]

• On Tommy’s social standing & behavior:
  “He seemed like a little volatile...and he would use swear words that none of us had heard before.”
  — Margie Walker, [06:13]

  “He kept putting his hand on my knee...He kept doing stuff like that.”
  — Martha’s diary, [07:36]

• Tommy’s lie about the alibi school assignment:
  “He said he was doing a report on Abraham Lincoln and the log Cabin. ...there was no such report due.”
  — Greenwich Detective Steve Carroll, [10:20]

• Changing stories under pressure:
  “[Tommy] changed his story and began to cry during the interview. Right. But there’s a lot of questioning that has to take place about that itself.”
  — Jim Murphy (Sutton investigator), [25:33]

• Sibling dynamics:
  “How can you go so many years and never ask your brother what happened...?”
  — Margie Walker, [40:32]

• On Peter Zaluka’s relationship and possible motive:
  “Jesus. If Peter ever found out, I would be dead.”
  — Martha’s diary, [42:07]

• On Peter’s theft of the diary:
  “Peter...tried to read you. They took you all the way over to the Wet and Halls and almost, but didn’t quite, read you. I could have killed him.”
  — Martha’s diary, [54:39]

• Expert speculation:
  “What if [Peter] had seen Martha with Tommy and got angry? ...this could be a crime of anger, because this was definitely overkill.”
  — Linda Kenney Baden, [56:38]

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Important Timestamps for Key Segments

• [01:32] – Introduction to Martha’s diary, emotional implications
• [05:25] – Entry: Martha visits Skakel house, introduces social circle
• [06:13] – Margie Walker recounts characterization of Michael and Tommy Skakel
• [09:19] – The last time Martha is seen alive
• [10:20] – Detective Steve Carroll uncovers Tommy’s false “homework” alibi
• [17:44] – Tommy’s changed story during the Sutton investigation
• [21:05] – Sutton report details Tommy–Martha sexual encounter
• [39:08] – Michael Skakel’s unequivocal statement that he never suspected Tommy
• [40:32] – Margie Walker reflects on Skakel sibling silence
• [54:39] – Martha describes Peter’s theft of her diary

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Conclusion and Forward Tease

The episode closes with a reminder that despite decades of investigation and ever-shifting suspicions, the Martha Moxley murder is still unsolved—haunted by a lack of forensic evidence, changing stories, and the limitations of memory and motive. Goldman promises that in the final episode, listeners will hear about the mysterious blood found by a Belhaven maid—perhaps “finally” shedding new light on Greenwich’s most infamous cold case.

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For listeners: This episode probes the reliability of alibis and memories, explores the sometimes-overlooked motives of those closest to Martha, and uses the words of a lost girl to restore complexity and humanness to a story often dominated by scandal and suspicion. For all its dead ends and contradictions, Martha’s voice—finally centered—compels us to keep searching for the truth.

Transcript

[Narrator/Advertiser]

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[Andrew Goldman]

That was the August 16, 1975 entry of Martha Moxley's diary, written about two months before she was killed. The diary excerpts you'll hear in this episode are voiced by an actor, and some entries are condensed for simplicity, but the words remain her own. Before, social media diaries used to be a big thing, especially with teenage girls. They served as a testament to existence, importance in the world, and even more than that, a totally non judgmental mother confessor. They were by definition private, their contents sacrosanct. Some even came equipped with cheap little locks. I didn't keep one. My sisters did. My older sister recently told me about the trauma she experienced when our mother read her diary when she was a teenager. It was such a violation that decades later, she's still not over it. So, at 53, do I feel a touch uncomfortable reading the multicolored, loopy scrawls of a 15 year old girl's diary? I do. But if I am violating her privacy, I'm far from the first to do so. After Martha's murder, the Greenwich police took her diary from her mother, Dorothy Moxley, as evidence. Years later, the diary would become an exhibit at Michael Skakel's trial. Every page was scanned and posted on Court TV's website. I've combed through the diary entries page by page. True to teenage girl form, many of them are about boys, the desirable ones Martha called foxes. The sheer number of suitors is overwhelming, like a swarm of cicadas suddenly descending upon this unsuspecting blonde Californian. The attention is obviously novel to her. There are mentions of objectively inappropriate, potentially dangerous situations that for Martha engender only excitement. Never fear. At 14, she writes of a salesman at the local sports car dealership taking her for joyrides in a Ferrari Dino and Maserati Bora. Here's Another excerpt from June 26, 1975.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Dear diary. Karen and I were walking home and we saw some guys and asked for some gum. Then we had to go to the bathroom, so they said we could use theirs. Then they invited us in for a beer. So we went and Mark was upstairs. Altogether, there were six foxes. Mark, Brad, Matt, Larry, Ralph, Skip.

[Andrew Goldman]

Martha didn't hold back in life or on the page. She chronicled the most intimate moments in her teenage life in great detail in that diary. I'm choosing to share excerpts of it here because I believe it's undeniably valuable. For one, it gives Martha a voice in a story that's been told by so many others. But there's another reason, too. Hidden in the pages of Martha's handwritten words, I found some passages that have for decades been overlooked. Passages that might finally provide new clues to who that October night in 1975 killed Martha Moxley. I'm Andrew Goldman from NBC News studios and highly replaceable productions. This is dead certain. The Martha Moxley murder. The Skakels barely merit a mention in Martha's diary until September of 1975. But apparently as summer turned to fall, she got to know them fast. Once school started. Martha was referring to what sounded like a well established routine on their property. On September 11, Martha wrote the Dear Diary.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

After school, I went to the Ortho. Then me, Jackie and Mooge went over to Skakel's house and did the usual in the mobile home.

[Andrew Goldman]

Mooge was Martha's nickname for her best friend, Margie Walker. The usual, as I think I mentioned some time ago, was smoking and drinking in the Revcon mobile home, which was usually parked in the Skakel driveway. When I spoke to Margie Walker, she said. In the fall of 1975, the core Belhaven cohort consisted of all 15 year olds, herself, Martha and Michael Skakel, plus the bubbly, eternally positive Jackie Wettenhall. Martha had a boyfriend at that time whom she'd been dating since the summer I mentioned him in the very first episode. His name, Peter Zaluka. Margie also had a beau. That left Jackie and Michael, who as.

[Margie Walker]

Margie remembers, he seemed like a little volatile and you know, crazy. And he would use swear words that none of us had heard before and things like that.

[Andrew Goldman]

In other words, a real catch.

[Margie Walker]

So I think we decided that he and Jackie would make a nice couple. We sort of as a group decided, well, okay, you two go together, you know, so now you're a couple. But I can't say they were really romantic.

[Andrew Goldman]

Not part of this cohort. 17 year old Tommy Skakel.

[Margie Walker]

Well, Tommy, first of all, Tom didn't hang out with us. You know, he was older and that when you're, you know, that age, like a couple years older, it's just like a different generation almost. So he wasn't around a lot when we were together.

[Andrew Goldman]

But Tommy possessed a superpower none of the 15 year olds had yet.

[Margie Walker]

The reason Tom was there is cause we needed a driver. The rest of us were too young, so he would get pulled into stuff like that. And we piled into the Cadillac.

[Andrew Goldman]

She means Rush seniors Fly Lincoln Continental with the illuminated crystal eagle on the hood.

[Margie Walker]

And you know, that was sort of exciting for all of us too to be in this car.

[Andrew Goldman]

Michael might have nicknamed the Lincoln the Love Mobile because of his father's romantic ambitions. But that fall, Tommy seemed to be milking the power of the luxury ride as well.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Dear Diary, me, Jackie, Michael and Tom went driving in Tom's car. Margie and I kept yelling out the sunroof. I drove a little then and I was practically sitting on Tom's lap because I was only steering. He kept putting his hand on my knee. Then we went to Friendly's and Michael treated me and he got me a double, but I only wanted a single, so I threw the top scoop out the window. Then I was driving again and Tom put his arm around me. He kept doing stuff like that.

[Andrew Goldman]

That last entry was from September 12, 1975, just six weeks before mischief Night, when Martha was killed. It's been a little while since we talked about it, so let me quickly refresh you on the goings on that evening. According to original police interviews with the Skakels, siblings, their friends and tutor Ken Littleton after the Skakels and Littleton returned from dinner at the Belhaven Club, a group of kids, including Martha, Michael and Tommy Skakel, ended up sitting in the Love Mobile listening to tunes. Then around 9:20 rush, John and Michael Skakel and their cousin Jimmy Tarrien commandeered the Lovemobile and drove it across town to Sursum Corda to watch Monty Python's Flying Circus, leaving Tommy, Martha, Jeffrey Byrne and Helen Ickx at the base of the Skakel driveway. The flirting was heavy. Tommy shoved Martha playfully and she screamed and fell into the Pachysandra patch. Two of Martha's friends told police they last saw her at 9:30 that night hanging out with her 17 year old neighbor Tommy Skakel near his home. Here's Dorothy Moxley.

[Margie Walker]

She and Tommy were flirting with each.

[Andrew Goldman]

Other and pushing each other and he.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Pushed her down and jumped on her.

[Andrew Goldman]

And that was the last they saw of Martha. Jeff and Helen, embarrassed by the interaction, decided to skedaddle. As they were leaving, Martha told Helen she'd be right behind her. The next day, Martha was found beneath a pine tree on the edge of her property. As you learned earlier in the series. In his 1975 interview with Greenwich police, Tommy Skakel said that after the horseplay in the driveway, Martha didn't stick around long when Dorothy Moxley called the Skakel house in the middle of the night looking for her daughter. Tommy related that he last saw Martha padding across the yard toward her house at 9:30.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Did she say anything to you when she left? Do you know for a fact that she said to you I'm going home? No, she didn't say she was going home. She didn't say she was going home? No, she said that sensed that she was going home. You sensed that she was going home? Yeah.

[Andrew Goldman]

Tommy said that after Martha left, he went upstairs to do some homework. That homework turned out to be a fib, as Greenwich Detective Steve Carroll would later recount.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

When we asked Tommy where he was, his whereabouts, he said he was doing a report on Abraham Lincoln and the log Cabin. And when we checked with his teacher in school at Brunswick School, there was no such report due.

[Andrew Goldman]

And there was more. At 9:50, neighborhood dogs began barking their heads off in the direction of the Moxley property. Dorothy Moxley would later remember hearing voices outside her home around 10pm by this time, cops concluded Martha was either already laying dead or dying amidst the autumn leaves. Skakel tutor Ken Littleton reported that when he'd meandered around the house to do a bed check at 9:45 Tommy was not in his bedroom. Where was he? It's unclear, but a half hour later, he materialized. Ken Littleton reported that around 10:15, Tommy came into Rushkakel Senior s room, plunked down and watched the famous car chase from the French Connection, which ended at 10:33. Here's Newsday reporter Len Levitt in a Dateline interview.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Years later, after Tommy leaves Martha at 9:30, about 40 minutes later, he turns up in Littleton's room watching TV.

[Andrew Goldman]

Tommy's being unaccounted for at precisely the time investigators concluded the murder occurred fueled their suspicions. It also didn't help that Martha had chronicled some of her flirtations with Tommy in her diary. As Greenwich detective Steve Carroll would later.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Tell NBC News, there's indications in her diary where Tommy was trying to get to first base, second base, hit a home run, all kind of things with sexual connotations in them.

[Andrew Goldman]

But there was a problem with the timeline. The cops trying to pin the crime on Tommy just couldn't resolve. At around 9:30, just when Tommy had reported that he saw Martha heading home, Andrea Shakespeare reported seeing him when she came to the door to fetch Julie's forgotten car keys. Shakespeare, you'll remember, had a little trouble with her recollection of that evening. Over the years, she notably and detrimentally to Michael Skakel's defense, claimed at trial he hadn't made the trip to his cousin's mansion, sursum corrida. But one thing that never wavered in Shakespeare's various accounts, when she went back to the house to collect the keys, Tommy Skakel answered the door.

[Margie Walker]

Tommy comes alone to the door.

[Andrew Goldman]

Crucially, if Tommy was inside to pass off those keys at 9:30, he wasn't with Martha. The story he told cops about parting with her around that time would seem to check out. And then there was the matter of what Ken Littleton told police about Tommy's appearance when the two watched the French Connection together in Rush Sr. S room. Here's Newsday reporter Len Levitt on Dateline.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Years later, they say to Littleton, well, look, Tommy's clothes. Bloody. What'd you notice about Tommy? Nothing. It was perfectly normal, says Littleton.

[Andrew Goldman]

Tommy repeated his story consistently over the course of multiple police interviews and also took and passed his second polygraph. His first, you might recall, was deemed inconclusive, as recounted by Greenwich detective Jim Lonnie. They were getting nothing.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

They were getting no reaction.

[Andrew Goldman]

He wasn't even moving the needles. Lunny would also remark on how Tommy maintained a placid demeanor through intense hours of Questioning, no sweat, no perspiration, very calm, cool and corrected. Tommy also stuck with his account in March 1976, after his father, confronted with the police's suspicions, had him admitted to Columbia Presbyterian for two weeks under an assumed name. I briefly mentioned this visit in an earlier episode. Tommy was put under the care of a psychiatrist named Stanley Lessie, who performed a variety of exams on him, long sessions recounting his childhood, tests with German names Rorschach and Bender Gestalt. Clutching a clipboard and pen, Lessy asked him a bunch of embarrassing questions, the answers to which Tommy would have known would be typed up in a report to be read by his rabidly puritanical father. Asked about masturbation by Lessi, Tommy replied that he did not masturbate. Asked about Martha, Tommy said, I never knew her. She was a good friend of Michael's. I only met her two or three times. Was she a sexy girl? Lessie inquired. She did not appear to be a very sexy girl to me, Tommy responded. You'll remember that. Lessee even injected Tommy with sodium amytal, considered a truth serum, and queried him on a quote, point by point basis as to the events that had taken place on the night of October 30th. Tommy, a needle phobe, wept as the syringe plunged into his arm, crying, take it out. But even pumped full of truth serum, Tommy's answers, Lessie wrote, remained exactly the same. He'd chastely said goodnight to Martha at 9:30, went into the house and never again set eyes on her. Lessie pronounced Tommy to be a gold star patient. In his report, he wrote to Tommy, quote, responded promptly to all questions. He did not appear to take questions lightly on the one hand, nor did he appear to be extremely apprehensive on the other hand. But the conclusion that certainly meant the most to Rush Skakel was this one I could not document. After repeated interviews, including a sodium amytal interview, that Thomas Skakel was responsible for the death of Martha Moxley. This was the pronouncement that caused Rush Skakel to excitedly trot over to the Moxley house in late March of 1976 and declare to Martha's parents that Columbia Presbyterian's best hedgehrinker had cleared his son. But here's the thing. It turns out that Tommy had lied to Lessie a lot. The new year brings new health goals and wealth goals. Protecting your identity is an important step. Your info is in endless places that could expose you to identity theft, leading to lost funds. Lifelock monitors millions of data points per second. If your identity is stolen, our restoration specialists will fix it, guaranteed or your money back. Resolve to make identity, health and wealth part of your New Year's goals with Lifelock. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit lifelock.com Special offer terms apply On Deck is built to back small businesses like yours. Whether you're buying equipment, expanding your team or bridging cash flow gaps, On Deck's loans up to $250,000 help make it happen fast. Rated A by the Better Business Bureau and earning thousands of five Star Trust pilot reviews, Ondeck delivers funding you can count on. Apply in [e-mail] depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by Ondeck or Celtic Bank. Ondeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.

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[Andrew Goldman]

In the early 1990s, Tommy Skakel's father turned to a private investigation firm. Both Tommy Skakel and his younger brother, Michael, gave accounts of their whereabouts to.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

The agency, which were inconsistent with their.

[Andrew Goldman]

Original statements to police. We've talked a lot in this series about how Michael Skakel changed his story in the years after Martha's murder with his strange tale of masturbating in a tree. It was Michael's admission of this incident during the Sutton investigation that drove Mark Fuhrman to conclude that Michael had to be the killer.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Please tell me why Michael would say what he said on the night of a murder 20 years later.

[Andrew Goldman]

I'm gonna implicate myself in a homicide.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

That nobody thinks I'm the suspect.

[Andrew Goldman]

By using Furman's logic, one could just as easily pose the same question about Tommy Skakel. You'll remember me mentioning earlier in the series that when speaking to Sutton Associates decades after Martha's murder, Tommy also changed his story. But I was being a little coy. It wasn't some small alteration in 1992, when the Sutton investigation kicked off. In addition to Founder Jim Murphy. The firm brought in two other bonafide investigators. One was Dick McCarthy, a retired FBI agent and good friend of Tom Sheridan, the Skakel family attorney. The other was Willis Billy krebs, an imposing 6 foot 6 former New York City detective. I spoke to him briefly while making the podcast, citing an NDA he signed decades ago. Krebs declined to comment on the case, but based on Sutton documents, he was deep in the investigative trenches, interviewing many people involved with the case, including Ken Littleton and Michael Skakel. The Sutton team had long wanted to get Tommy Skakel in the interview chair, and in 1994, Margolis finally allowed them access to his client for reasons he later explained to dateline, that was never a concern to me as Tommy's lawyer because it was clear to me that he wasn't involved. It was a decision that he'd come to regret. On October 7, 1994, Tommy Skakel sat down across from Billy Krebs and Dick McCarthy in Margolis's office in Stamford. It had been almost 20 years since he'd spoken to any investigator about the case. Krebs, the towering ex cop, had a reputation as a relentless interrogator. According to Jim Murphy, he's not the.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Guy you want after you. He's very thorough, he's very intelligent, and he was doing what he was doing for a very long time. On the police department.

[Andrew Goldman]

Under intense questioning by Billy Krebs, Tommy began to weep. And out of nowhere, his story, which he'd stuck to for nearly two decades, suddenly did a 180.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Tommy. Now, when he's being interviewed by Sutton Associates, all right in front of his attorney, tell us a different story.

[Andrew Goldman]

It wasn't some small change. As I mentioned, it was a whopper. Tommy tearfully admitted that he'd been lying when he said he'd last seen Martha at 9:30 on Mischief Night. He said that Martha had not in fact gone home, but rather stuck around for another 20 minutes or so, and that he'd had a sexual encounter with her on the grass 50ft behind the skakel house. Here's how the Sutton team recorded Tommy's new story in their report. They began an extended 20 minute kissing and fondling session, which the report noted culminated in orgasm. At this point, approximately 9:50pm Both Martha and Tom rearrange their clothes and Martha says goodnight. She is last seen by Tom hurrying across the rear lawn towards her home. The report report further noted that after leaving Martha, Tommy re entered his house but never changed his clothing or showered. This was a Drastic evolution of Tommy's story. As Manny Margolis would later acknowledge, Tommy.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Suddenly was with Martha that evening. Hadn't told the police about it. Well, they knew he had been with Martha.

[Andrew Goldman]

But the story changed at the point where the Sutton report took place to.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Be more in line with what the details of what happened, which became a sexual encounter.

[Andrew Goldman]

Yes, sir. The timing of Tommy's story change is also significant. It was October 1994, and O.J. simpson was in jail awaiting trial, having been arrested four months before. The Simpson case was all over the news, as was talk about how newly advanced DNA science would be used in his upcoming trial. Anyone who wasn't living under a rock would have now learned about DNA testing and its ability to crack open cold cases, even ones that were decades old. And in fact, the Connecticut state's attorney had in 1991, declared their intent to test evidence from the Martha Moxley crime scene using new techniques in the hopes it might bring fresh answers to the long dormant case. Could that have been why Tommy's story changed? Could he have been trying to account for his DNA potentially being found on crime scene evidence years later? Jim Murphy and others I've spoken to think it's possible.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

I think Tommy had to come up with an explanation why some of his DNA might have been found on Martha.

[Andrew Goldman]

Remember, at Michael Skakel's trial, the state had presented a parallel theory that Michael's infamous masturbation in a tree story materialized because he was trying to account for his DNA possibly being linked to the crime scene. But as you'll recall, Michael had told the story to his friend and state's witness, Michael Meredith, as well as to Bobby Kennedy, before DNA was widely used in criminal cases. As for Tommy, Newsday's Len Levitt reported hearing a different reason that he may have changed his story.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

I pushed very hard on this, and the explanation I was given by one of the Skakel people was that he knew his father would be very upset if he said that he had sex with Martha. That would have bothered the father, and he was afraid to tell this to the police because of that.

[Andrew Goldman]

Obviously, Levitt is using the term sex loosely. Tommy never claimed that he and Martha had sexual intercourse. But recall that Michael also says he didn't come forward with his own story. Change the masturbation in a tree tale for the same reason. Fear of Rush Skakel Sr. S reaction. Regardless of what precipitated Tommy sharing, he'd just taken himself from being the last known person to see Martha to something much more sinister. Someone who'd lied about the circumstances of their final encounter. And not only was Tommy placing himself with Martha near the scene of the crime, he was doing it at 9:50pm right around the time when the neighborhood dogs began barking their heads off. Widely believed to be when Martha was attacked. But if investigators thought they had a smoking gun, there was a problem. Given Tommy's new story, how just after 9:30, could he have both been fooling around with Martha outside, but also simultaneously at the front door, handing the forgotten car keys to Andrea Shakespeare? Tommy had an explanation for this. He said that after horsing around with Martha in the driveway, he told her he had to go inside the house for a moment and instructed her to wait for him just inside the door by the driveway. What did he need in the house? A beer for the road to use the bathroom? Unclear. But as soon as he got inside the house, Tommy said he heard the doorbell ring. He answered the door, passed the car keys to Andrea Shakespeare, and then went back to Martha, who was waiting for him where he'd left her inside the back door. And then Tommy said he and Martha headed outside to make out on the lawn. Afterwards, Martha went home, and that was the last he saw of her. It was at this point in the interview, as he would later tell Jim Murphy, that Krebs felt like he was close to making a breakthrough.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Billy Krebs felt as if he had Tommy on the ropes because Tommy had changed his story and began to cry during the interview. Right. But there's a lot of questioning that has to take place about that itself. Now he's upset and he's crying. That's when you keep going.

[Andrew Goldman]

But Murphy says KREBS Partner, Dick McCarthy wasn't on the same page.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

And at that point, Dick McCarthy says he's all upset. We should take a break. Or words to that effect. Billy Krebs position on it was, let's keep going. We're right there. Let's keep going.

[Andrew Goldman]

They didn't keep going. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Tommy's lawyer, Manny Margolis, pulled the plug on the interview after what his client had just disclosed. He must have been in shock. Here's Jim Murphy.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

The things that Tommy was saying. It was the first time Margolis was hearing them.

[Andrew Goldman]

It was, yes. How do you know that?

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

He never would have allowed him to say that. Not after the story that he had for so many years.

[Andrew Goldman]

Yet, for reasons unknown and frankly difficult to fathom, though, he stopped the interview that day. Marcolis allowed Tommy to sit for a second interview four months later in February of 1995, Tommy was back in front of Sutton investigators answering more questions. The story that Tommy told was largely the same as his first sitting, with a few minor alterations. This time, he said he hadn't told Martha to wait inside for him, but rather that she'd done it of her own accord, surprising him. Why would Martha have come into the house uninvited to wait for him? The Sutton guys asked his reply as cited in their report. Maybe she wanted more of Tommy. And there was another deviation. In his first interview, Tommy had stated that Martha had forcibly and verbally rejected his advances when he tried to feel her breasts at the side of the house. In the second version, Tommy only remembered asking Martha if she wanted to make love, and her replying, no. When pressed about the changes, Sutton investigators wrote in their report, Tommy could offer no clarification. He simply repeated, I don't know, or didn't reply at all. Many divergent and damning conclusions can be drawn, the report concludes, but any conclusion, good or bad, will remain only speculation. Without further cooperation and clarification from Tommy Skakel, there was to be no more cooperation or clarification. After Tommy's seemingly disastrous interviews, Manny Margolis revoked Sutton's backstage pass to Tommy Land. Reporter Len Levitt would later talk about the Sutton investigation hitting this dead end with Tommy on Dateline.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

They could never get him back to that point again, never finished. Whatever ended that story. That's it. Stopping Tommy right here may have prevented his telling all that he knew about this case.

[Andrew Goldman]

By shutting down the interviews, Manny Margolis probably thought he'd pushed his client out of the way of a speeding bullet. And the new details that Tommy divulged might never have become public. But then, as you'll likely remember, a year later, someone leaked information about the Sutton investigation to levitt. And in November 1995, Tommy's story changes were making headlines and reorienting the focus of investigators. Greenwich detective Steve Carroll, who'd since retired, told Dateline in 1998 that although he'd long been convinced that Ken Littleton was Martha's killer, Tommy's new admission about Mischief Night had tipped the scales.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

We did do quite a extensive background on Ken Littleton, and he did some strange things. We thought that at that time, yeah, this guy's a pretty good suspect. But then as we went over it and over it and over it and over it, you come down to Tommy Skakel.

[Andrew Goldman]

By admitting that Martin Martha had denied his advances, Tommy had inadvertently opened the door for investigators to assign him something he'd never had before a motive.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

What's the motivation? Motivation is sex, rejection, humiliation. Most definitely. Most definitely.

[Andrew Goldman]

It's true that in Martha's diary there's a bit of mixed messaging about Tommy. Her September 12, 1975 entry is all fun and ice cream, as you heard earlier in the episode.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

We went to Friendly's and Michael treated me and he got me a double, but I only wanted a single, so I threw the top scoop out the window. Then I was driving again and Tom put his arm around me. He kept doing stuff like that.

[Andrew Goldman]

But from an entry just a week later, Martha's mood seems to have changed considerably.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Michael was so totally out of it that he was being a real asshole in his actions and words. He kept telling me that I was leading Tom on when I don't like like him, except as a friend. I said, well, how about you and Jackie? You keep telling me that you don't like her and you're all over her. He doesn't understand that he can be nice to her without hanging all over her. Michael jumps to conclusions. Just because I talk to Tom, it doesn't mean I like him. I really have to stop going over there.

[Andrew Goldman]

By the time Mischief Night rolled around a month later, Martha was apparently back on the Skakel bandwagon, and eagerly so. If you'll recall, she actually came by the Otter Rock House twice that night with Helen Nix while the Skakel kids were out to dinner at the Belhaven Club, finally meeting up with them on her third attempt. Based on the playful roughhousing that ensued in the driveway, it appears that Tommy was firmly back in Martha's good graces. Martha's apparent hot and cold stance towards Tommy didn't go unnoticed in his 1975 police interview. 11 year old Jeff Byrne, who'd left the driveway with Helen Icks as Martha and Tommy's flirting ratcheted up, had this to say.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Was there any conversation between you and.

[Andrew Goldman]

Helen when you were walking home to.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Your house and her house?

[Andrew Goldman]

Yeah.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

What were you talking about?

[Andrew Goldman]

Just about Vulcan.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

What about?

[Andrew Goldman]

It's just how she leads boys on.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

You thought she was leading Tommy on at this time?

[Andrew Goldman]

Byrne was just 11, but the sexual tension he witnessed was palpable even to him. An indication, perhaps that Martha and Tommy might have had different expectations of what was to come of their flirtation that evening. It's important to note that Tommy was never charged in relation to Martha's murder. But it probably won't surprise you to learn that some people close to the case, including Sutton's Jim Murphy still suspect that Tommy may have been involved with Martha's murder.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

It'd only be logical based on the documents that we have. That'd be Tommy. Now, I obviously don't know everything. Our investigation was cut short, but there are a number of things that kind of line up that suggest that it could very well be Tommy. Now, again, I'm not saying it is him. I'm saying there's good reason to think that it's him.

[Andrew Goldman]

Murphy also has thoughts about how exactly that night might have gone down. Whether Tommy was involved or not.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

I think that there was a second attack.

[Andrew Goldman]

His theory is that the killer, whoever he was, first attacked Martha near her driveway where a large pool of blood was found. Then later, plagued by a concern that she might have survived the initial attack to identify her assailant, returned to make sure she didn't.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Probably a classical act with someone who, in a moment of passion, takes someone's life and then afterwards thinks, are they really dead? At some point, somebody comes and drives the remaining part of the golf club, the shaft, if you will, the handle part, through Martha's throat.

[Andrew Goldman]

Part of this hypothesis stems from Murphy's review of the autopsy report. In the report, the medical examiner, Dr. Elliot Gross, noted that there was very little bleeding from the puncture wound to Martha's throat. This suggests that Martha was already dead or extremely close to death when the injury took place. It's not confirmation that there was a second attack, but it doesn't rule it out either. In 1998, retired Greenwich detective Steve Carroll had proposed something similar. That Tommy returned to the crime scene, but just to move Martha's body, not necessarily to attack her.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Again, again theory, when Tommy goes back into the house and then realizes that he can't leave the body there because she'll be found too quick, returns outside and drags her another 65, 75ft under the tree where she has come to final rest. So about midnight in your theory, Tom Skakel goes back to the now dead Martha Moxley and drags her. Not necessarily dead. She may not be dead. May not be dead, may not be dead, but drags her into. Drags her.

[Andrew Goldman]

Right. If we accept investigators conclusion that the first attack on Martha occurred just before 10pm however, this theory of a return trip to the crime scene, at least as it pertains to Tommy, has a major flaw.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

This part of the story that he met Kenny Littleton in the house and they were watching the French Connection.

[Andrew Goldman]

This meetup, according to Ken Littleton, occurred around 10:15pm in Rushkickle Senior's room. Which means for the two pronged attack theory to be viable, Tommy would have had to make the one trip for the initial assault, take a brief movie watching break, then make a second trip back to Martha's yard to move her body. The problem with the idea of a second attack is that Martha's murder was extremely violent. Whoever killed her most likely would have been covered in blood. Recall from earlier in the series that Ken Littleton, in a police interview in December of 1975, had this to say to the best of his recollection, Thomas was attired as he had been when he went to dinner, which matches up with Tommy's account of not changing his clothes after his encounter with Martha. The choreography, going in and out of the house, changing clothes twice after two separate attacks, and disposing of them unseen and unnoticed by anyone seems virtually impossible, especially for a 17 year old kid. Tommy has always denied being involved in Martha's killing. In Bobby Kennedy's book Framed, when asked whether he was about to confess during his Sutton interviews, Tommy had this to say. Confess to what? I wasn't going to admit to something I didn't do. I had just had enough of holding that sexual encounter in for all these years. But I figured if dad finds it out at that point, I don't care. It was too much, he said. Rush's staunch Catholicism meant fooling around with a girl was a mortal sin, and if Rush had found out he'd done so with Martha, Tommy was terrified of what he might do. There's no physical evidence connecting Tommy to the murder of Martha Moxley, though there was enough circumstantial evidence to keep him at the top of an investigator's suspect list for years. But police never brought charges against him, and since Michael's conviction was vacated, there has been no indication that they intend to reinvestigate Tommy or anyone else for the murder. Tommy may have initially fibbed to the Greenwich police and drastically changed his story years later, but he's been interviewed many times by cops, Sutton associates, and by mental health professionals. Sometimes while hooked up to a polygraph machine point blank, he always said he didn't do it. Did you know for sure who hit her?

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

No. Did you hit her? No.

[Andrew Goldman]

I reached out to Tommy Skakel on numerous occasions, asking him to speak with me for this podcast. He declined, saying in a text message, quote, that chapter of my life is something I've worked hard to put behind me. It was a difficult experience and I prefer not to revisit those memories. Tommy, more than most other Characters in this series remains in many ways a mystery, though there are glimmers of his Persona in the documentation of the case. Manny Margolis, in some of his memos, refers to his client as prone to delusions of grandeur and vulnerable to unsavory characters trying to dupe him out of money. Tommy also seems to have had a knack for coming up with get rich quick schemes. Martha's friend Helen Nix says he brought one to her marketing company in the 90s, hoping for help to create an infomercial.

[Margie Walker]

Tommy invented a golf club. It was a sandwich, and he came.

[Andrew Goldman]

And brought to me to see if I could help market it.

[Margie Walker]

And it was called the Terminator.

[Andrew Goldman]

That's right, a Tommy Skakel golf club called the Terminator. Helen says she didn't end up getting on board, and the product never did come to market, but it left her with a specific impression. Then I was just like, there's just no possible way he would have ever done anything like this and. And invented a sand wedge called the Terminator. Helen's not alone. It seems that a lot of people in Tommy's life had a hard time believing he could be capable of the crime. Even someone who might surprise you, given their lifelong animus. It would have been so easy at any point for Michael Skakel to. To point the finger back at his brother.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

If I knew my brother Tommy murdered Martha Moxley, I would absolutely say something in. In a heartbeat.

[Andrew Goldman]

But Michael never has.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Honestly, I didn't think my brother Tommy did it. I just don't. I. For some reason, I don't think so, no.

[Andrew Goldman]

As I mentioned, Michael and Tommy are now estranged, but Michael says they had one. One conversation about the murder many years ago while rooming together in Las Vegas.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

After I got out of Elan, I asked him and I just said, look, if you did this, I forgive you. And he just didn't say anything. And I never brought it up again with him.

[Andrew Goldman]

Though it might be hard to fathom the this level of non communication between family members, especially about a topic that so dramatically impacted their lives for decades, it tracks with other accounts of how the very traumatized Skakel kids interact. Margie Walker, Martha's best friend, testified twice in Michael's Appeals, once in 2007 and again in 2013. Something from the latter experience has always stuck with her.

[Margie Walker]

When I went up to testify for the habeas corpus trial, we took a lunch break and I went out to lunch with some of the Skakel brothers.

[Andrew Goldman]

She remembers having lunch with John Rush Jr. And David she says Stephen might have been there as well. I checked with Steven and he confirmed he was.

[Margie Walker]

And I asked them, what does Tom say about all this? You know, I've never heard his side of the story about that night. And they responded by, we never asked him. Which I thought was kind of surprising for all those years to go by and never even ask him. I was like, how can you go so many years and never ask your brother what happened, details about the evening? Because he was the last person who was with her. And normally you would think you'd start there and then try to find out.

[Andrew Goldman]

What happened, whether or not they ever specifically asked him. Brothers John and David Skakel, when interviewed by Dateline in 2016, were adamant that neither Michael nor Tommy had murdered Martha, though they didn't seem to have a lot of other insights into their brother Tommy. Here's David.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

My impression was that Tommy grew up like all of us did and settled down and became, you know, the calm creature that he is today.

[Andrew Goldman]

Only Martha Moxley could confirm or correct Tommy's account of what happened on Mischief Night. But if you were looking solely at her diary for clues about who killed her, you'd likely cross Tommy off the list. Because while Martha might have thought Tommy was a little forward, she never expressed actual fear of him. Remember this entry from earlier in the.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Episode, I drove a little then, and I was practically sitting on Tom's lap because I was only steering. He kept putting his hand on my knee.

[Andrew Goldman]

What you didn't hear was what she wrote next.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Jesus.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

If Peter ever found out, I would be dead.

[Andrew Goldman]

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[Andrew Goldman]

Pepper threw out Martha Moxley's diary entries in the months before she died Is a boy whose name I mentioned earlier in the episode. Peter Zaluka, her boyfriend. Peter and Martha started dating in August 1975, a little over two months before her murder. He was a young sailing fanatic who grew up in his father's massive hilltop chateau known by everyone in town as the Castle, a mansion on 36 acres with a driveway a quarter mile long. Peter was Italian with an incredible pedigree, a direct descendant of Giuseppe Garibaldi, the famed Italian revolutionary, considered one of Italy's great national heroes. More relevant to Martha, with his sleepy eyes and tousled dark hair, Peter was a major Volpe. That's fox in Italian. Here's Martha's best friend, Margie Walker.

[Margie Walker]

Peter had like a maybe not a full motorcycle, but like a mini bike that he would ride around in the driveway and things like that. I mean, Peter kind of came off as a little bit of a bad boy. You know, people were attracted to him because he was a little bit mysterious.

[Andrew Goldman]

Based on Martha's diary entries, she and Peter had about a month of unadulterated lust and joy. Here's August 19th.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Peter and I left and walked along the path and had a few kisses on the side. And August 20th Peter gave me the worst wedgie Boy. Is he dead? He told me that he'd cry if I died. How sweet.

[Andrew Goldman]

But things seemed to change as soon as September came. Peter had been living in the fortress like so called Castle with his father, a stockbroker and his stepmother, a former fashion model. Peter did not seem happy. He was moody and stoned a lot of the time. On September 2, Martha wrote this in her diary.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Dear Diary, well, today I've been going out with Peter for one month. Pretty decent. Today Peter goes back to Old Church Road to live with his mother. He called me and he says that he is very nervous about starting school. Summer is gone. Bummer.

[Andrew Goldman]

As September wore on, it was clear that Peter was becoming increasingly morose. The bloom was off the rose of the romance. Here's an entry from September 11th.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Dear diary, I talk to Peter a lot today. Sometimes I wonder why I go with him. He's always telling me that he hates me. But Margie talked to him and he said that he hopes that I know he's only joking.

[Andrew Goldman]

A few days later, on September 15th, it's clear that things weren't improving.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Dear Diary, yesterday I decided that I really don't like Peter anymore. I just got done talking to him for around an hour and I got everything out that I wanted to say. And he still insults me. I guess I don't really hate him, but I don't really like him that much. He won't bring himself down low enough to apologize to me.

[Andrew Goldman]

The next day didn't seem to be any better.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Dear Diary, Peter was being his usual self again. Margie talked to him and she said that the reason he wasn't talking to me was because he got really wasted and he felt like everyone was laughing at him and he just couldn't talk.

[Andrew Goldman]

After Martha was killed, Peter was first interviewed late on the evening of Halloween along with a bunch of other local teens who had gathered at a Belhaven house. A few days later, Captain Keegan and Detective Lunny showed up at Nancy Zaluka's house in the old Greenwich neighborhood, three miles north of Belhaven, to speak with her son at greater length. According to the police report, Peter told the cops a notably conflict free story about his relationship with Martha, not mentioning any of the issues Martha had expressed in her diary. Peter said that since they'd started dating over the summer, there'd been, quote, no secrets from each other. And to his knowledge, Martha, quote, had not had any problems, nor was anything bothering her. This was not, of course, how Martha's diary portrayed their relationship, nor how her friend Hellenix and mother Sissy described it to police in April of 1976.

[Margie Walker]

Things could get very violent and moody and he'd be so mean to Martha sometimes.

[Andrew Goldman]

Peter said he'd last seen Martha at School at 2pm the day of her murder. They had plans for her to come over to his house and cook him dinner, but he said he begged off because he was too tired and just wanted to go home and go to bed. As for his whereabouts on the night she was murdered, Peter provided a very thorough alibi. After coming home from school around 2:30pm he was sleepy so napped until 6pm when his mother woke him. He ate dinner from 7 until 8:30pm with his mom, then watched TV with her from 9 to 11 the French Connection and then they watched the late local News together from 11 to 11:30pm at which point his mother went to her bedroom. But they were again reunited near 12:45am when his sister away at college called the house and mother and son saw one another. And the alibi didn't even end there. He said that he and his mother were again together at some point later in the early morning hours, standing at the front door watching two Greenwich police officers making a driving related arrest. Peter, it seemed, had more facetime with his mother in one night than I generally do with my own teen sons. Over the period of a week. Afterwards, he went to bed and was awakened the next morning at 10am by his mother. A very detailed account which did not contain mention of any attempts to contact his girlfriend Martha over a 15 hour period. Peter's mother Nancy, the report notes, concurred with her son's interview, which she bore witness to since they were not separated during questioning, and also added to his story. She told the detectives that she was a recipient of one of Dorothy Moxley's worried phone calls. At 3:40am she told Dorothy that she hadn't seen Martha and Peter had been home with her all night. The report reads at this time, Mrs. Zaluka reported she checked Peter's room and he was asleep. The report continues. She related she also received other calls from Mrs. Moxley later in the morning, 6am to 7am concerning the whereabouts of Martha. She then woke Peter. So as you just heard, Peter reported his mom woke him up at 10am But Nancy told detectives she woke him at 6 or 7 after Dorothy Moxley called a second time. Which was it? The detectives didn't flag the discrepancy. As the interview wrapped, Peter told the cops two additional details. One that based on past conversations with Martha, she frequented a two story two room shack on the Skakel property. In their apartment, the cops noted that they'd already checked out said shack and cleared it. Also, Peter said he believed Martha would not be involved with any other boys. As was their custom with many Belhaven kids, Greenwich detectives polygraphed Peter on November 12, 1975, asking him the same four questions they'd asked other neighborhood teens.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Did you kill Martha Moxley? You know for sure it will kill Martha Moxley?

[Andrew Goldman]

And deemed his denials to be truthful. Saluka is also notably absent from media coverage of the case. Over the years, he's barely mentioned in Mark Fuhrman's book, and the name Saluka is not mentioned once in Len Levitz. In fact, it appears Peter only spoke to one journalist in all these years, Tim Dumas, the Greenwich native who published Greentown in April 1998, two weeks before Mark Fuhrman's book came. Peter's story to Dumas started out the same as the one he'd told the cops that he'd canceled dinner plans with Martha due to being tired, though now he noted that it was likely due to excessive pot smoking. From there, he added a few other curious details. For one, despite the fact that he didn't have a driver's license, he says his mother offered to let him take the car to see Martha on Mischief Night, but he declined. The reason? He heard branches tapping at the window of his mother's house and got freaked out. For once in my life I was scared, he said. I was like, no, I'll stay home and watch the French Connection. This from a strapping 16 year old once described to me as being physically imposing. Here's Steven Skakel. He was a tough kid. I didn't know him as well as my older siblings, but I definitely got the feeling he was a guy you didn't mess with. In another Deviation from his 1975 story to Cops, Peter also told author Tim Dumas his mother had woken him up when Dorothy Moxley called looking for Martha, and that he spent the rest of the night wondering, though not deeply concerned, about Martha's whereabouts. I probably went to sleep thinking there's no problem, she's over at Sheila's house, or something like that. It's no big deal, he said. In the morning came a second worried phone call from Mrs. Moxley. Yet Peter never mentioned making any effort to track his girlfriend Martha down, including joining any of the ad hoc searches that were unfolding a few miles away. Whatever concern that may have been building apparently did not motivate him to leave the house. He told Tim Dumas that he learned of Martha's death from a call his mother received, which would have come well after noon when her body was found. You might already be thinking that this is a bit of an odd story that what you've heard should have been enough to make the Greenwich police take a genuine look at Peter as a suspect. In February 1976, Greenwich detectives were told by Houston's eminent forensic pathologist, Dr. Joe Yehimchik, that the probability of this being the act of a stranger is, in our opinion, very remote.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

This is somebody, not a stranger. This is somebody either right here or she who knew the young lady.

[Andrew Goldman]

Studies show that among female murder victims who know their killers, roughly half are killed by a husband or intimate partner. Jealousy is a regularly cited motive. What if moody, possessive Peter had found out that Martha was regularly flirting and more with other boys, including Tommy Skakel?

[Narrator/Advertiser]

I was practically sitting on Tom's lap. Jesus, if Peter ever found out, I would be dead.

[Andrew Goldman]

Turns out there's a pretty strong indication that Peter might have found out. On September 28, almost exactly one month before Martha's murder, she wrote about a pretty notable incident in the life of a teenage girl.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Dear diary, as you've probably noticed, you are a little mutilated because Peter, Dicky B and Tyler came over and tried to read you. They took you all the way over to the Wet and Halls and almost, but didn't quite read you. I could have killed him.

[Andrew Goldman]

When I first read that entry, the possible implications gave me chills. Peter, who had been in a dark mood seemingly for a month, had attempted to read Martha's diary, then snatched it and made it all the way to Jackie Wettenhall's house. Jackie's house was behind the Moxley house, a couple lots away on Field Point Road, but not right next door. So Peter got far enough to be out of sight? Certainly. How long did he possess the diary? How could Martha be so certain that they didn't quite read it? Did she just take Peter's word for it? And if he didn't read it, how did the diary get mutilated? One thing's for sure. Had Peter opened practically any page and perused it, he likely would have been very unhappy. It chronicles numerous makeouts before Peter, a recent clear desire to dump Peter, and a hefty tally of boys who seemed eager to take Peter's place. And of course, the increased appearance of the Skakels, particularly handsy Tommy. In his 1975 interview with police, Peter had painted his relationship with Martha as drama free. But we know from Martha's own words that this was far from true. And we know that for some reason, Martha's plan to go and cook for Peter at his house on Mischief night got scuttled at the last minute. Peter also made sure, seemingly out of nowhere, to tell cops he didn't think Martha was involved with other boys. But based on his theft of her diary just weeks earlier, it seems highly unlikely he would have believed that. So what else might he have been hiding? Here's trial attorney Linda Kenney Baden, who you remember from prior episodes, Martha's boyfriend.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Who would have a motive to kill her. What if he had seen Martha with Tommy and got angry? This could be a crime of anger because this was definitely overkill.

[Andrew Goldman]

I want to walk you through a rhetorical scenario. What if the story Peter told years later about his mother offering him the car was actually a tell of some kind? What if Peter did in fact go to Belhaven on mischief night and make his way to the Skakel house, where he knew by his own admission to police, Martha liked to hang out? When interviewed by Police in 1991, Cissy Ickx, mother of Martha's friend Helen, remarked that anyone passing the Skakels around 9:30 would have seen Tommy and Martha clearly illuminated by the headlights of the love mobile before it pulled away. They also had the lights from the.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Car, so anybody could have seen that.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Burning with.

[Andrew Goldman]

They had the lights from the car, Sissy said. Anybody could have seen that scene. They could have seen Martha flirting with Tom. What if, after observing this upsetting display, Peter parked and approached the Skakel house by foot only to witness Tommy and Martha's flirtation escalating with a sexual encounter in the grass? Here's Martha's best friend, Margie Walker.

[Margie Walker]

One possibility that I've always thought about, if she's out there with Tom getting a little frisky or whatever they were doing, and she rebuffs him because he wants to take it a little bit further, and then she leaves. And somebody's watching this whole thing because remember, people are wandering around the neighborhood. They're doing things, you know, if Peter had seen that and she didn't know he was there, would he be jealous?

[Andrew Goldman]

Could a blind with jealous rage Peter have grave grabbed a stray golf club from the Skakel lawn and followed her home in the dark? Could he have confronted Martha in her own driveway only to have things escalate, culminating in the deadly assault? It's a lot of what ifs, I know, but the biggest one is what if investigators had looked more closely at Peter from the outset. It seems they took him at his word, including every part of his unusually detailed alibi because his mother vouched for him. Michael Skakel has long taken issue with this, understandably, since his own robustly established alibi was attacked aggressively at trial.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Martha's boyfriend, his mom says, oh, no, he was with me all night. And that's an alibi. That's okay for them, but not for us. Okay.

[Andrew Goldman]

There are many questions that investigators didn't ask Peter that I would have loved to, but you can probably guess where this is headed. In the years after Martha's murder, Peter Zaluka seemed to spiral.

[Margie Walker]

I think Peter was kind of a. What do you say? I don't know. Live wire or a little unpredictable or troubled, I guess is a good word.

[Andrew Goldman]

That's Margie Walker again.

[Margie Walker]

So his life didn't really pan out the way he would have wanted, and he did some carpentry. You know, he got involved in drugs, things like that.

[Andrew Goldman]

By the late 2000s, Peter had been arrested multiple times, including twice for criminal mischief and once for battery of a household member. His life had obviously taken a wrong turn. And on February 8, 2011, at age 51, it ended in Santa Fe, unexpectedly, according to his obituary. In the mid-90s, when Tim Dumas interviewed him, Saluka suggested that the wrong turn began even before Martha's murder. Things went wrong for me when my parents got divorced, he said. That was before Martha, obviously, but not that many years before. So I was going through a really rough time in my life. Peter told Dumas that he'd been kicked out of his mother's house and then abandoned by her and his sisters when they reached relocated to Santa Fe, which traumatized him. It was almost like another death. He said. My girlfriend leaves me, and then my mother and sisters leave me there. I am left in Greenwich. Peter's one alibi witness, his mother, Nancy, died in 1992. I was able to talk with Peter's sister Gina, a few times in 2025. It was clearly painful for her to speak about her brother's life in death. I asked her why he'd gotten in so much trouble. He was unhappy, she said. Why? I asked. Because of two things, she said. Their father had not been nice to his underachieving only son. In fact, she said she had to move mountains to make sure that Peter wasn't totally disinherited. And the other reason for his unhappiness? I asked. She paused for a very long time. Because Martha died, she said finally. But he did not kill Martha, she added. Was Peter Zaluka yet another kid caught in the blast radius of this murder or someone who should have been looked at a lot more closely? We can't say for sure because the theories in this episode are purely circumstantial. There is no forensic evidence tying either Tommy Skakel or Peter Zaluka to this crime. In fact, as has been noted again and again throughout this series, apart from the scene of Martha's murder, this is a case almost entirely devoid of forensic evidence. I say almost, but there are a few exceptions. There were those hairs found on the sheets Martha's body was wrapped in, which matched back to no one. There was the DNA testing when the case was reopened in the early 1990s. That came up dry. But those of you with a memory of elephants will recall that at the very beginning of this series, I mentioned that Teresa Tirado, a Belhaven maid, told police she'd seen blood inside a home the morning Martha was found. It was the only report of any blood outside the crime scene, and it was spotted in a house Martha Moxley knew. Well, we're coming to the end of this long journey. At last, you, the patient ones, the curious ones, will finally learn the truth about that mysterious blood, fresh revelations about the case, and so, so much more. Next time on the final episode of Dead Certain the Martha Moxley Murder.

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

I was in the bus waiting for Martha and she came in one day and I'd never seen her that upset.

[Andrew Goldman]

What kind of blood was it?

[Various Interviewees (including Tommy Skakel, Jim Murphy, Len Levitt, Manny Margolis, Steve Carroll, and others)]

Was it drops of blood? Was it shoe prints?

[Andrew Goldman]

He was kind of creepy, too.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

It was scary. He was kind of a scary guy.

[Andrew Goldman]

How the hell did they miss her?

[Margie Walker]

How the hell did I find her?

[Andrew Goldman]

And they missed her? From NBC News studios and highly replaceable productions, Dead Certain the Martha Moxley Murder is written, reported, executive produced and hosted by me, Andrew Goldman. Alexa Danner is executive producer. Richard writer and head of audio at NBC News Studios. Megan Shiels is senior producer and writer. Rob Heath is our producer. Nora Battelle is our story editor. Fact checking by Simone Buteau and Laura Hunkadea. Production assistance by Brendan Wiesel. Sound designed by Rick Kwan, Mark Yoshizumi and Bob Mallory. Original music by John Estes. Amanda Moore is our production manager and Marissa Riley is the director of production. Liz Cole is president of NBC News Studios. Thanks for listening. New episodes of Dead the Martha Moxley Murder Drop Tuesdays through January 20th. Did you know? 39% of teen drivers admit to texting while driving.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Even scarier, those who text are more.

[Andrew Goldman]

Likely to speed and run red lights. Shockingly, 94% know it's dangerous, but do it anyway.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

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[Andrew Goldman]

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[Narrator/Advertiser]

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[Andrew Goldman]

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[Narrator/Advertiser]

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