October 2, 2025 • 45 mins
Welcome back, Spooky Squad, to another episode of Scream and Sugar.
In this episode, we review the 1975 murder of 15-year-old Martha Moxley in the affluent community of Greenwich, Connecticut. Found bludgeoned to death with a golf club, Martha’s case shocked the nation and remained unsolved for decades. We explore the events leading up to that Halloween night, the influence of the wealthy Skakel family, and the twists, trials, and controversies that kept this case in the headlines for years.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/scream-and-sugar-true-crime-coffee-hour--6015946/support.
This content is not appropriate for all viewers; viewer discretion is advised. PS. Let's just umbrella all our content with a blanket statement: allegedly, supposedly! Stay spooky, squad.
In this episode, we review the 1975 murder of 15-year-old Martha Moxley in the affluent community of Greenwich, Connecticut. Found bludgeoned to death with a golf club, Martha’s case shocked the nation and remained unsolved for decades. We explore the events leading up to that Halloween night, the influence of the wealthy Skakel family, and the twists, trials, and controversies that kept this case in the headlines for years.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/scream-and-sugar-true-crime-coffee-hour--6015946/support.
This content is not appropriate for all viewers; viewer discretion is advised. PS. Let's just umbrella all our content with a blanket statement: allegedly, supposedly! Stay spooky, squad.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome back, everyone to another episode of Scream and Sugar
at the True crim podcast that dives into the darker
side of humanity while saving a little sweetness on the side.
I'm your host, Candace.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
And I am Sahara, and today we're.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Going to be talking about the murder of Martha Moxley. Okay, so, hi, Saharah.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
I know, Candace, how are you?
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (00:55):
You know what, I don't care an.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
We finally broke her.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
We were going to ask you guys anyway, Yeah, if
we did a poll and we said, how many of
you would like to hear some more cussing?
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Yeah? Do you care that we cuss? I know that
there was one review that we've got that said we
were vulgar and the other words the F bomb. But
I feel like that's kind of the a podcast because
you can cuss on them. It's not like we're on
a radio show.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
So we're gonna do where We're gonna do it, and
then you know, if you hate it, just fill out
the pole and then we'll stop.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
Maybe. I don't know, I don't know if at.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
The very least, maybe I'll just I'll tone it out.
I'll meet so let us know your thoughts.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Do it going sound it's just you.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Saying gone gone.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
Yeah, it's already the middle of the semester, which is
wild to me. It's about to be October, which is
my favorite month of the year. Yeah, spooky, about to
put up all of my Halloween decorations because Alex's dad
is leaving tomorrow and he's put up, like Alex has
(02:09):
put up like a couple of things outside so far
that he's found in the garage. And I have a
ton you're ready, I have like two toads full of
Halloween star like those babies are coming inside. Ople's first
Christmas to Mavro. I know, wait, do I say Christmas
Halloween too?
Speaker 2 (02:25):
And it's her first Halloween.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
Alex wants to dress her up like a bumblebee, but
I'm probably gonna do a poll on that too. Should
we do a bumblebee? Should we make her a little
demon or devil? Should she be a princess one of.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Those angel cast names is like the floating halo.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
Should she be Mothman?
Speaker 2 (02:41):
It's not a terrible idea.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
So yeah, it's the most wonderful time of the year.
And I had mentioned before on social medis I made
a little posty post about you guys sending in listener tales.
We are still looking for some of those. So if
you've got a scary story, like a haunting, if you
had a weird encounter with aliens, if like any of
(03:05):
those cool paranormal things, send us a little right up
about it that we can tell on the podcast and
we could feature yours in the near future.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Absolutely absolutely, we love that idea, so send it in.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
Then also sent as a voicemail, but I could not
hear it, So if that was you, it's from the
Boston mass So some massholes sent in a voicemail and
there's it's just silence for like fifteen seconds. Maybe you
can help me figure it out.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
Like it's a butt dial me me.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
I know, awesome, So resend that call us anyway. This
case is from the seventies, so it takes place on
October thirtieth, nineteen seventy five, on Mischief Night, which is
Halloween Eve, and it takes place in Greenwich, Connecticut. And
(04:02):
if you've ever been to Connecticut, it is old money,
super bougie. This area, specifically this neighborhood, specifically a multimillion
dollar manchi and very affluent families.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
So it's kind of the society of Connecticut.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
So it's a bunch of teenagers in bell Haven, which
is the neighborhood that they're from, going out pulling pranks,
you know, ding dong ditchen teepian houses. I don't know
if you ever did this as a kid. Oh yeah,
I did it on Halloween, though I didn't do it,
like we didn't have a mister.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
It was the day of Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
So this s gated community. It was one of those
places where you let your kids kind of have free
reign of the area. Kids would be riding their bikes,
staying out until the lights came on. The street lights
came on, and no one really locked their doors because
there didn't seem to be a need for it. Like
I said, it was gated. They had a security I
(05:00):
believe it was the Pinkertons that did security for this
little community, and they basically had their own little police
department in this small town. Wow. So before this night,
there hadn't been a murder in the area in over
thirty years. Wow. Okay, so spoiler alert, someone gets murdered.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Spoiler alert, it's mischief.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Yeah, it's mischief night. And yeah, so one of these
teenagers was fifteen year old Martha Moxley. She was in
the middle of her sophomore year at Greenwich High School.
She had been born, she had been so, she had
been born. She was born in San Francisco in nineteen sixty,
(05:45):
the daughter of David and Dorothy, and they had literally
just transferred from California, like San Francisco, to Connecticut the
prior year. Okay, she had one older brother, John, and
so they were just kind of getting used to life
in bell Haven. Everyone that talked about Martha after her
death said that she was just this super bubbly girl.
(06:09):
You immediately wanted to be friends with her. She was
always smiling, and she became super popular right away. She
had gorgeous long blonde hair and just by everyone like
most of the boys had crushes on her. All the
girls wanted to be your friend type of girl, gotcha, Yeah,
super athletic and wicked smart. One of her friends said
(06:35):
about her afterwards. Martha had this way of making you
laugh even when you didn't feel like it. She just
had that kind of energy.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
So, oh, man, were Martha?
Speaker 1 (06:44):
So during that fall, Martha had started spending time with
these two neighbor boys that were uh, their house was
like across from hers, and these two boys their names
were Thomas and Michael Skaicele. Thomas was the older of
the two, he was seventeen. Michael was the same age
as Martha, fifteen, and there are accounts of them like
(07:08):
going out to get ice cream, and both boys were
interested in Martha. Both boys were also very competitive with
one another. Okay, as boys are teenage boys. The Scalele
family was like it was a wealthy neighborhood, but the
scale family was like above and beyond like wealthy in
this neighborhood. They also had a family connection to the Kennedy's. Ah,
(07:33):
so that's their level, that's their level. They come from
like the Kennedy dynasty, the Russian SCCL, the Russian Scale Senior,
the dad his sister had married Robert Kennedy.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Okay, yeah, so it gives you a little bit of
a preview under that. He also was in charge of
the Great Lakes Carbon Corporation, which was one of the
most profitable industrial companies at that time in the world.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Okay, so they're they're rich rich.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
They come from money, yeah, money, money. Unfortunately, two years
prior their mother Anne had passed away from cancer and Russian.
I don't know if he was an alcoholic before this,
but his wife's death death definitely exacerbated his drinking. He
was rarely home and there were seven children all together
(08:34):
in this household, the scale household. Six of them were
boys and one of them was a girl. So they
were just kind of left of their own vices. It
said most of them struggled with alcoholism. They kind of
like this house was the party house on the block
because there was no supervision. They were typically taken care
of by like nanny's tutors and the like. And it
(08:56):
was kind of like this revolving door of these people
coming in and taking care of them and then you know,
another person would step in.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
And I also feel like when you are working for
such a wealthy and affluent family, as the quote unquote
the help, right, those kids probably walked all over you know.
There wasn't really an authority. They were rich, Yeah brats. Yeah,
speaking of thongs.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Rolling down on my belly, I feel that.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
So.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
Thomas or Tommy, was the second oldest of the sons.
He was super athletic, confident, popular, total jock, and he
did have a reputation for being super aggressive if things
didn't go his way. Oh no, Michael was more even
more troubled. By thirteen. It was said that he had
(09:46):
a severe drinking problem and he would quite frequently go
on benders and I would blackout and also be extremely
aggressive man. He was also said to have been impulsive
and insecure and always seeking approval.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Well if he sounds like he's being raised by his
older brother.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
So that checks. So by nineteen seventy five, this household
had already gotten that reputation in Bellhaven. They were loud kids, unruly,
super prone to wild behavior, and everyone kind of looked
the other way just because they were connected to the
Kennedy family, right, so it kind of made them untouchables,
(10:31):
so they could kind of they could get away with
pretty much anything.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Oh no, I wonder what's gonna happen.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
So Martha had written in her diary a couple of
weeks prior to her murder that these Scica boys she
thought that she really needed to kind of separate herself
from them because Tommy had a way of being very
forward with her and he would just be insistent on
(11:00):
like touching her legs and like just trying to get
her to do things that she was not comfortable with.
Oh no, when I had mentioned they had gone out
for ice cream before, she was kind of sitting in
between Michael and Tommy. But she says in her diary,
She's like, I was basically on his lap during the drive.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
And I'm sure that was by his design.
Speaker 1 (11:22):
Exactly, yeah, exactly. So on Mischief Night, Martha was actually grounded.
She had gone out the previous week and didn't come
home until like two o'clock in the morning, which was
way past her curfew. Her mom at first told her, no,
(11:42):
you can't go out for Misshif night. No, you have
to stay home. You're grounded. Her dad, who seemed to
be more of the enforcer, was out of town on
a business trip in New York at the time, so
she ended up kind of wearing her mom down to
the point where her mom was like, Okay, fine, you
can go out. Did you have a curfew of nine thirty?
And she was like, okay, awesome, thank you. So she
(12:04):
goes out. Her mom so she remembers making her a
girl cheese sandwich before she left, and then right after
that she'd gone over to her friend's house and had
ice cream, and then they ended up at the Scicle residence.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
Oh No.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
A little bit later that night, Dorothy, Martha's mom, had
stayed up October thirtieth and waited up for Martha to
come home once her curfew passed. She was a little
annoyed that Martha once again wasn't following the rules. Her
brother John had arrived home on time, and so he
was kind of like he was always kind of the
(12:39):
bad egg in the family from their from his point
of view, Martha was always seen as the golden child.
So he was like, finally, this one time, like I'm
on time and she's not, and she's in trouble and
I'm not. And uh So at first they're just kind
of like, okay, it's mischief and I maybe she got
a little too drunk and you know, she got carried
a yeah, lost track of time, you know, as we do.
(13:02):
But then as the night got later, like later into
the night, like eleven twelve, Dorothy was like, something is wrong,
Like she wouldn't be this late, like maybe thirty minutes,
maybe forty five minutes. So she starts calling Martha's friends
(13:23):
and some of her own friends too, just to see
if they've seen Martha around. Martha's friends let her know
that the last time they saw her she was at
the scale of Residence hanging out with Tommy and the boys,
and so she's like, Okay, maybe she just is over there.
So she calls over the Scalow residence asks if they've
seen Martha. They say no, and then by by like
(13:46):
three o'clock in the morning, Dorothy's freaking out. She calls
the cops. She lets them know that her daughter is missing.
It's the seventies, it's the seventies. Yeah, so she's like
she's hoping that she just passed out, you know, but
she's really worried and this is typical behavior of her daughter. Surprisingly,
the police immediately start a search.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
I will say money right right, the influence.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
And the influence of money, and they probably had nothing
else going on, you know.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
Because you said it was like a really like there
wasn't a lot of crime, and there there.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
Wasn't a lot of crime, and there had not been
a murder for over thirty years at this point. So
they show up at the house, start peeking around inside,
trying to see if maybe she just passed out in
a different room or you know, maybe came back. They're
asking her friends, like did she stay the night with you? No.
(14:38):
In the morning, Dorothy goes over to the scape of
the residence, knocks on the door, and Michael comes to
the door. She asks, have you seen Martha? He says no.
He says no, and they have like this little travel
travel now they have this little travel trailer off to
the side of the house, and she was like, can
I take a peek in there? Maybe she wandered in
there and passed out, so they peek. She's not there.
(15:02):
Her brother John had also been driving around town trying
to find his sister as well, So he's just going
to all the spots that he thinks that she could be,
doesn't turn up anything, and then he has to go
to uh practice, I think it's for lacrosse. Yeah, rich people, wealthy.
(15:25):
So they're scanning like they're the perimeter. This house is
on five acres to mind you, so they're scanning. They
haven't found anything. Surprisingly, because when you hear about this
crime scene, it's kind of wild to me that they
didn't immediately find a trail of blood. They didn't find
any like parts of the weapon that was used, and
(15:51):
none of this kind of gets pieced together until about
twelve thirty in the afternoon, and this is when one
of her friends, Sheila, is walking through the backyard from
her yard, so they're kind of half adjoining yards. She's
walking through the backyard and she sees what she describes
as just like this lump. I don't know. She's like,
(16:16):
it looks weird. She goes over to further investigate, like
maybe it's a prank or something, and sees that it's
actually the brutally bludgeoned body of Martha.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
Oh my god.
Speaker 1 (16:27):
Martha's pants and underwear had been pulled down to her
knees and she was laying on her stomach, but was
completely unrecognizable, like her hair was stained with so much
blood that they couldn't even tell that she had blonde hair.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Next to the body, there was also a broken golf
club shaft, and not the shaft sorry, she had been
stabbed through the neck with the shaft. So there's the
head of the all club that I'd been used to
brutally beater. The shaft had broken, and so the broken
(17:05):
part of the shaft had been stabbed through her throat.
That's brutal, very brutal, and the grip of the golf
club is missing at this point. So when she gets
to the house, she's like pale as a fucking ghost
and she just looks at Dorothy and she's like, I
(17:26):
found Martha. Instead of Dorothy going to go identify the
body or go look at Martha, her friend, Dorothy's friend,
offers to go and check on her and see if
she's alive, and her friend, once she goes over there,
she immediately puts her hand on Martha's body and it's
ice cold. Yeah, so she's like she's she's been gone
(17:49):
for a while.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
What a horrific scene. And this was just outside you said.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
This was on their property. She had been dragged to
this location underneath the pine tree on the property, which
is like two hundred yards from the front door.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
Oh my god.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
So pretty immediately, this golf club is traced back to
this Scalel family. It has an insignia on it for
and Scalel, so it's literally a monogram of her initials
and it's like a custom set of clubs too, so
it's the six iron. And when they go and look
(18:26):
at the remaining clubs in this golf bag. The six
iron is the only one that's missing. Allegedly, these clubs
had been laying around the backyard of the Scale residence
because they like to hit golf balls in their gigantic yard.
They would just hit them off the back patty or whatever. Okay,
(18:47):
So when you pieced together like where these clubs came
from and who she was last seen with, who do
you think immediately would is the murderer and you're the
forefront of your mind.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
Michael, Tommy, Wait and the mom.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Holy shit, she's the ghost of Anne Scapell Jesus Christ.
So yeah, immediately the case kind of shifts towards Tommy
and Michael as being their primary suspects. But Michael's eliminated
because he he has an alibi that's pretty air tight
by all accounts.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
Really, what could Michael possibly have been doing?
Speaker 1 (19:34):
So when they were hanging out over at the Scale residence,
they had all kind of climbed into this Lincoln town car.
Tommy had not arrived yet, so it was Michael and
Martha and her friends, and Michael and Martha were in
the front. They were listening to music. Tommy ends up
getting into the driver's seat and kind of pushes Martha
(19:55):
over to the middle seat so she's in between Tommy
and Michael. He starts doing the whole grab in her
leg shit and then the two of the older sccal siblings.
So two of the older brothers eventually kick them out
of the car at around nine point thirty and tell
them we're taking our cousin back to his house. We're
going to go watch the premiere of Monty Python and
(20:20):
allegedly cool as yeah. Right as they're leaving, Michael hops
in the car with them and goes to go watch
the movie.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
So his alibi is his brothers for the police able
to verify.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
They all testify that he was with them, so they
gave him the alibi of being with them from about
nine thirty to eleven. Okay, and this is important for
later in the case, so keep that in the back
of your mind. Tommy, however, was seen and Martha's friends
(20:53):
are the ones that kind of give him up. They're
seen making out over by the pool and then and
her friends kind of got uncomfortable with the heavy petting
that was going on between the two of them, and
the last they see of them, they fall over this
fence together into the bushes essentially, and then her friends
(21:16):
are like weirded out, so they're like, we're leaving because
they've been flirting a bunch that night and it just
got to the point where like, okay, this is like
a lot of PDA going on, and we're dipping right.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
I mean, I understand if people are about to start
banging right in front of you, it.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
Is probably to go awkward. It can be very awkward.
So so yeah, so the friends leave at this point,
and it's around nine forty five, so around the same
time that they'd all gotten out of the car, they're
kind of like, all right, see Martha. And from Tommy's testimony,
he says that after that Martha left like she kind
(21:51):
of decided that she that's not what she wanted, so
she decided to go home. She had a curfew. Michael
had also said that he had offered, or he had
invited her to go over to watch Monty Python with them,
but she declined because of her curfew. So she was
being responsible and was heading.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Home, according to them.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
According to them, and then she ends up dead the
next morning on her own property. Okay, So, like I
had mentioned before, she had been dragged to the location
where her body was eventually found. There was a trail
of blood that led from the driveway to the spot
where she was dragged to underneath a tree, which to me,
(22:37):
I don't know, she's a fifteen year old girl, and like,
I don't know, it's just kind of weird to me.
They they say that it was only one person, but
I feel like two people might have been involved in this.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
So they what they think she was walking, somebody hit
her in the back of the o in the club,
dragged her to the tree and finished. Yeah, really started
hammering right.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
Because there there was just a trail of blood from
the driveway to the tree, and then at the tree
there's obviously that's where she spent her last moments, and
there's more blood that's been pulled there.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
That sounds okay, And then she was obviously sexually assaulted
at the tree as well.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
She actually was not sexually assaulted. There was no evidence
of sexual assault. Surprisingly, so people think that I might
have been staged with the pants, with the pants and
the underwear down around her knees, because there was no
evidence of that allegedly.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
Wow, okay.
Speaker 1 (23:44):
The police also did not do a great job of
securing the scene, and one of them went on the
police scanner and was talking about it, and of course
every news outlet within I don't know, hundred miles found
out about this, and we're on the scene, like fly
some shit, Oh my god, what an idiot, right, what
(24:09):
an idiot? And also all these reporters are traps and
neighbors too are trapsing through the crime scene, and it's
not enough. Everyone there. People are taking pictures of her
body and just like kind of like the same thing
that happened in Rebecca because the house case, it was
just like a media frenzy and for whatever reason, people
(24:30):
have the need to take pictures when they really should
not be. It's very disrespectful. When police were canvassing the neighborhood,
neighbors had mentioned a bunch of dogs barking at around
ten pm, like nine thirty tenka, which was kind of odd,
(24:51):
like a lot of the dogs, like sure they would
bark every once in a while, but a lot of
them were freaking out, like very bizarre behavior. And one
lady also said that she had heard like loud voices
and some hollow thumping sounds geez, which is insane to me,
but then the dogs kind of settled down, so they're like,
(25:12):
it's mischief night, probably just some teenagers out doing their thing.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
Well, nothing ever happens there.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
I'm sure what happens there. So they're like obviously not
thinking that it's a brutal, horrific murder exactly. So Tommy
had told them his alibi was basically like, I stayed home.
Martha went and did her thing. She went home. I
stayed home, and I had a book report do, which
this is. This is the weekend. So he's not even
(25:42):
it's not even due the next day. So he's like,
I had a book report, do you? And when they
ask him what he's researching, he says, Abraham Lincoln for
a seventeen I guess. So he's a junior. And just
who's the first president that comes to mind when I
tell you, like a president, When.
Speaker 2 (25:59):
You say president, I'd definitely go George Bush. But that's
because I think about him a lot.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
I wonder how he's doing.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Specifically George w Now watch this drive that guy.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
The guy that almost choked on a pretzel. I remember that,
you know that guy camp with him. When they asked
his teachers about this later, they all were like, no,
like there, we weren't studying any of the presidents at
this point in.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
Time book report and yeah, Abraham.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Abraham Lincoln, okay, sir, which is wild to me. His
so that they had just had a brand new tutor
start that day who had just moved in with them
as well. Kenneth Littleton okay, Kenneth. Kenneth told detectives that
he and Tommy had watched a movie and then Tommy
(26:51):
had gone up to his room to do his report. Okay,
I'm like cool, story, bro, Michael, he lets, He tells detectives. Yeah,
I went over to my cousin's house. I didn't stay
the night there. We watched the Monty Python premiere of
was It World Circus? I can't remember what it's called,
(27:13):
Circus something, the Circus one, And then he returned back
home around eleven o'clock.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
And by the time he got home, everybody was just chilling.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
By the time he got home, everyone was chilling, and
there was everyone was accounted for. There was nothing weird
going on. Martha wasn't there, and he just went right
to bed.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
M okay whole time, pulling the rest of you listeners
out there as well. You are a high school boy
who was not being super fed by anybody. It is
mischief night. All of your friends are partying. Are you
going to bed at.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Ten the party house?
Speaker 2 (27:55):
Yeah too? Are you kidding me? This is ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (27:58):
I know it's not adding up to me.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
Yeah, this is just my personal opinion, allegedly suposedly.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
But so you would think that this six iron would
be like a red herring, like it would definitely lead
them to the Scale boys, at least one of them.
They were both seen with her that night, right you think.
But for some reason, the one part of the golf
club that they could have potentially pulled Prince from the
(28:29):
grip is missing, and so detectives set out to find
this piece of evidence because they feel like it's going
to be the one thing that they can actually have
as solid evidence improving who killed Martha.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
That's my thing, is I'm even think about I mean,
homie said Abraham Lincoln pulling off the grip.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
You also have to think that his he's from money,
and he's also a Kennedy. Right, Oh, there's likely other
people help them cover. That's kind of what I was
thinking covered it anyway. Um, so they go out looking
for the grip, and they're draining ponds nearby. They're also
dragging the little lake that's nearby, and like looking around
(29:17):
anywhere that they can to try and locate this, but
it is never found.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
Oh my god. Okay, so I think I misunderstood. I'm
getting it now. So she was found in her own yard, Yes,
with the freaking golf club from the mock or from
the scalcol Boy's yard. Golf club's from there. She's found
in her own yard. She's been and she's been beaten
with this freaking she's.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
Been beaten with the golf club. And she's also been
dragged from the driveway, which is where she was initially attacked,
pulled into the yard and placed underneath this pine tree.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Okay, yeah, it's this cackle Boys period and a story.
I don't even know why we're here. We're about to find.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
Out that it gets really logo and I mean, I
don't know. We don't have a lot of time, but
I will try to get as far into this as
I can. Russian Senior, because there's a Russian junior. Russian
Senior gets notified of this murder and immediately comes back
from a hunting trip that he'd been away on and
(30:44):
immediately lawyers up and at first he had given police
unfettered access to his kids, like you can question them,
like I know they're not involved type of thing. They
don't get search warrant because of this because they're worried
that it'll be denied essentially, so as long as he's
(31:07):
cooperating with the police, they're like not going to get
a search warrant. They end up having Julius Gaegel, who's
the one daughter of these seven siblings. She is the
one that carries out the search of the house instead
of the police. What in the world, uh huh, Which
(31:28):
I'm just like, how the hell only money, How the
hell did that happen? So she's yeah, she's the one
that goes through the house and is looking for the
grip for this golf club. And that's the only thing
also that they could even get a warrant for, Like
if they're looking for a specific item I guess in
the seventies, that's the only thing that they could use
in a court case if that's what they had asked,
(31:50):
Like that's what they had uh wanted for the search warrant.
So if that's like what they requested for the search
warrant and they found it. Cool, that could be used,
but any other circumstantial evidence could not be used. Wow. Wow,
doesn't make any sense to me. They don't find it, well,
or she doesn't find it.
Speaker 2 (32:11):
I gotta be for real with you. Even if they
did find it.
Speaker 1 (32:14):
She wouldn't have given it up.
Speaker 2 (32:16):
Well yeah, and if their fingerprints around it, they'd be like, well, yeah,
we use it to yeah hip holes all the time.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Exactly. That's true too. That's true too.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
How can they prove unless convenient the fingerprint was on
top of a bloodstain.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
Well, so from from the get go they were looking
outside of the community. They're like, it had been an outsider.
There's no way it was someone from inside of her.
Speaker 2 (32:36):
This reminds me of that Mandy Stavick case. We did
huh where They like, it has to be somebody else,
and the person killed her was within a mile of.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
Her, had exactly exactly, so there's like nothing like this
ever happens. So it's clearly an outsider that somehow got
through security or was visiting for the night. Okay, So
another possibility or another possible sense respect that they brought
up was Ken Littleton because he's literally new to the community. Yeah,
(33:04):
is at Scale residence. He is obviously an outsider. He
had access to the golf clubs, and he also has
a week alibi compared to Michael and Tommy.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
Doesn't he alibi Tommy though.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
He does alibi Tommy.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
But also he's an adult.
Speaker 1 (33:25):
He's an adult. He's twenty three at this point, a
grad student, and after this case, his life kind of unravels.
So if you follow up on Ken Littleton a little
after this, he goes gets into some shit like he's drinking,
taking drugs. He's in and out of jail for like
(33:46):
petty larsony, petty larceny and just these small time crimes.
But he takes a news dive pretty deeply.
Speaker 2 (33:54):
Something traumatized him.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
Also, he has a polygraph taken and fails it twice.
So he's got something that's I.
Speaker 2 (34:06):
Wish we knew exactly what questions it was.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
You know. The ties to the Kennedy is another thing
that investigators have to kind of take into consideration with
this case. Scalele family as obviously very wealthy. They have
a lot of pool in the community and they're not touchable.
(34:28):
Like I had mentioned, before they had kind of been
estranged from the Kennedy family, but still had that connection
and a lot of powerful allies in their circle. What
Dorothy recalls in one of her interviews is that the
next morning a limo pulls up to the Scale residence
(34:53):
and she it looks like some pretty high profile people
will step out and greet Russian and going at the house.
So I don't know that was, but it's kind of weird.
Speaker 2 (35:05):
I mean, who travels by limo? I don't know. I
don't run circles.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
I don't know. I don't love the limo o. Hers
would be cooler.
Speaker 2 (35:14):
Way cooler. Hearse pulls up, I'd be like weird timing, uh,
but sick but dope.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
So after this investigation into Tommy, he also he has
a couple of polygraphs done as well. The first two
are inconclusive and then the third one he passes. They
end up ruling him out as a suspect because of
(35:43):
the polygraphs and because yes, and because he has the
alibi with Ken Littleton. They also rule out Michael because
everyone corroborates his alibi as well, so he's no longer
looked at as a suspect. Ken lion cannot be placed
at the scene of the crime either, so they rule
(36:04):
him out as a suspect. And many people believe at
this point in the community that it was just a
drifter that somehow got into their little gated community, killed
Martha and then took off because they were right by
the freeway.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
No way. Yes, they managed to perpetuate that story.
Speaker 1 (36:21):
They managed to perpetuate that story. And Dorothy even at
Martha's memorial, which was on November fourth, so only like
a week later, not even a week later, she actually
goes up and gives Tommy a hug because she's she
feels bad for him because he's been suspect number one
in this investigation from the get go, and then he's
ruled out as a suspect. That there's no way, there's
(36:44):
no way that he was the one that did this.
So she goes up and gives him a hug. So
technically no one has ever been charged in the murder
of Martha Moxley. Oh my good. No are coming up
on the fiftieth anniversary this year, Oh my god, which
(37:08):
is wild to me. So case goes completely cold for
years and years and years, and then out of nowhere,
In nineteen ninety one, another Kennedy family member is dragged
into the limelight. William Kennedy Smith is facing allegations of
(37:33):
rape involving Patricia Bowman from Palm Beach, Florida, and he
eventually has all of these charges dropped, of course, but
it kind of opens up this can of worms of like,
how do these Kennedy's cousins and whatnot keep getting away
with these atrocious crimes. So people had stopped really talking
(37:57):
about Martha Moxley, but when William Kennedy gets picked up
on this rape charge, they're like, what the hell? Like
they are obviously a very powerful and influential and rich family.
They can't keep getting away with shit like this. And
when the charges dropped, people start returning to Martha Moxley's
(38:21):
case and they're like it had to have been one
of the scale boys. And William is also allegedly at
this party the night that Martha dies, so then they're like,
did he do it? And it was just never mentioned
that he was in town. Turns out that's not true.
He was not in town for this. But it starts
to have like this wheel start ticking in a lot
(38:43):
of investigator like like small time saluts and other detectives.
They start thinking about this case again, and eventually Rushton
is just so fed up with having these accusations against
his sons that he hires his own private investigators to
look into the case, to look into all of like
the the autopsy, to look into all the case notes
(39:07):
that had come up about this, and is just wanting
definitive proof that his sons were not involved in this,
and unfortunately the opposite happens.
Speaker 2 (39:18):
Oh oh oh, bad news.
Speaker 1 (39:21):
But so these investigators end up compiling what later becomes
known as the Seton Report, and they're looking into Michael
and Tommy's alibis, and Michael and Tommy are cooperating because
(39:42):
obviously these people are there to protect them, and their
stories about the night that Martha died start to change
pretty dramatically. At that Michael tells these investigators, these detectives
(40:16):
that he or private investigators. He tells them that actually
he didn't go right to bed after watching Monty Python
with his cousins. Oh, he went over to the Moxley
residence and was throwing rocks at Martha's window, trying to
get her to come outside. So this is placing him
(40:36):
at the scene of the crime. Hmm. He also claims
to climb up into a tree to see if he
can get so he's a peeping tom. Climbs up into
a tree to see if he can get a view
of Martha and starts jerking off. He emits this in
the tree. This is what he admits. He says, he
(40:58):
jerked off to orgasm. You chok about thirty seconds and
he pulls his pants back up, climbs down the tree
and goes home. Why would he admit to this?
Speaker 2 (41:11):
Honestly, I'm I'm shook. Either he thinks that they're going
to find his DNA somewhere or.
Speaker 1 (41:18):
Someone might be able to place him at the scene
of the crime because they've seen him, I know.
Speaker 2 (41:21):
But like no one said anything going into that kind
of detail too him, Like, are you just a chronic oversharer?
Speaker 1 (41:27):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (41:27):
I think so, because I got a lot of goosebumps
from that one. It's gross, really creepy, really creepy that
poor girl did. She was already feeling so pressured.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
Tommy Skegle's story is also Tommy Scgle's story also changes
also also also every time you hear Also in this episode,
and you have to drink water. Drink. Tommy Scagle admits
(41:57):
to the investigators that he actually wasn't completely truthful about
that night. Is either he didn't have the book report
on Abraham Lincoln though. Also he says that he and
Martha spent a little bit more time together that night
and they had masturbated each other to orgasm, so they
(42:18):
had done some heavy petting and didn't have sex, and
of course she was found to still be a virgin
from her autopsy, but he claims that they masturbated each
other to orgasm and then she went home, hm, which
is so weird to me.
Speaker 2 (42:36):
I feel like they just got weirder and weirder the
more they talked, right.
Speaker 1 (42:41):
And I also think that that's another drink you guys.
Speaker 2 (42:47):
Oh y'all are going to be p and three times he.
Speaker 1 (42:53):
Was thinking that his DNA could potentially be found on
her body as well, or they had found evidence of it,
and that's why they were kind of relooking into the case.
So both of these boys are admitting that their DNA
might have been found on Martha's body.
Speaker 2 (43:07):
Now, I mean, you would hope his DNA wouldn't have
been in there if it was I mean the Michael,
the younger one, if he was jacking off on a tree. Yeah,
but that's so weird. That is a weird thing to say.
I agree. And then the boy they had been like
making out and having the heavy, heavy petting session already,
so I'm.
Speaker 1 (43:24):
Like, but not to the point where people what they
were having anything more than just a makeout session. His
DNA would have still been found on her too, because
they'd been swapping spit.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
I don't know. I definitely in my mind, I was like,
there's probably some hands going down some pants and stuff.
Speaker 1 (43:40):
I mean, maybe drink. They're drinking your kid, your kids,
teen stars, horny teenagers taking no for an answer right
that as well, so very pushy. So I think we're
gonna stop here and we'll pick up where we get
to an actual rest and a trial, and there is
(44:03):
all kinds of crazy religious things that are going on.
There's gonna be a little RFK junior appearance. How do
you feel about that.
Speaker 2 (44:13):
Let's stay tuned for that be.
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yeah, and so we'll pick up. Probably it's not until
around the October two thousand where we actually get any
type of an arrest. Wow. So yeah, long time twenty
five years after her murder. Yeah so yeah, okay. If
you guys have any case corrections, if you have any
(44:36):
case recommendations, or you want to suggest a tasty spot
for us to go check out in town, hit us
up on the old Instagram.
Speaker 2 (44:44):
At Scream dot and Dot Sugar dot podcast, Facebook, Scream
and Sugar, True Crime Coffee Hour, TikTok, Scream Dot and
Dot Sugar, Gmail, Scream and Sugar Reno at gmail.
Speaker 1 (44:55):
Dot com, or you can leave us a voicemail.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
At seven seven five three, eight six two one eight
to five.
Speaker 1 (45:01):
Thanks for hanging out with us until next time, Stay
soupie yall.
Speaker 2 (45:05):
Bye bye bye
Welcome back, everyone to another episode of Scream and Sugar
at the True crim podcast that dives into the darker
side of humanity while saving a little sweetness on the side.
I'm your host, Candace.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
And I am Sahara, and today we're.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Going to be talking about the murder of Martha Moxley. Okay, so, hi, Saharah.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
I know, Candace, how are you?
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (00:55):
You know what, I don't care an.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
We finally broke her.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
We were going to ask you guys anyway, Yeah, if
we did a poll and we said, how many of
you would like to hear some more cussing?
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Yeah? Do you care that we cuss? I know that
there was one review that we've got that said we
were vulgar and the other words the F bomb. But
I feel like that's kind of the a podcast because
you can cuss on them. It's not like we're on
a radio show.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
So we're gonna do where We're gonna do it, and
then you know, if you hate it, just fill out
the pole and then we'll stop.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
Maybe. I don't know, I don't know if at.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
The very least, maybe I'll just I'll tone it out.
I'll meet so let us know your thoughts.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Do it going sound it's just you.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Saying gone gone.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
Yeah, it's already the middle of the semester, which is
wild to me. It's about to be October, which is
my favorite month of the year. Yeah, spooky, about to
put up all of my Halloween decorations because Alex's dad
is leaving tomorrow and he's put up, like Alex has
(02:09):
put up like a couple of things outside so far
that he's found in the garage. And I have a
ton you're ready, I have like two toads full of
Halloween star like those babies are coming inside. Ople's first
Christmas to Mavro. I know, wait, do I say Christmas
Halloween too?
Speaker 2 (02:25):
And it's her first Halloween.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
Alex wants to dress her up like a bumblebee, but
I'm probably gonna do a poll on that too. Should
we do a bumblebee? Should we make her a little
demon or devil? Should she be a princess one of.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Those angel cast names is like the floating halo.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
Should she be Mothman?
Speaker 2 (02:41):
It's not a terrible idea.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
So yeah, it's the most wonderful time of the year.
And I had mentioned before on social medis I made
a little posty post about you guys sending in listener tales.
We are still looking for some of those. So if
you've got a scary story, like a haunting, if you
had a weird encounter with aliens, if like any of
(03:05):
those cool paranormal things, send us a little right up
about it that we can tell on the podcast and
we could feature yours in the near future.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Absolutely absolutely, we love that idea, so send it in.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
Then also sent as a voicemail, but I could not
hear it, So if that was you, it's from the
Boston mass So some massholes sent in a voicemail and
there's it's just silence for like fifteen seconds. Maybe you
can help me figure it out.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
Like it's a butt dial me me.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
I know, awesome, So resend that call us anyway. This
case is from the seventies, so it takes place on
October thirtieth, nineteen seventy five, on Mischief Night, which is
Halloween Eve, and it takes place in Greenwich, Connecticut. And
(04:02):
if you've ever been to Connecticut, it is old money,
super bougie. This area, specifically this neighborhood, specifically a multimillion
dollar manchi and very affluent families.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
So it's kind of the society of Connecticut.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
So it's a bunch of teenagers in bell Haven, which
is the neighborhood that they're from, going out pulling pranks,
you know, ding dong ditchen teepian houses. I don't know
if you ever did this as a kid. Oh yeah,
I did it on Halloween, though I didn't do it,
like we didn't have a mister.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
It was the day of Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
So this s gated community. It was one of those
places where you let your kids kind of have free
reign of the area. Kids would be riding their bikes,
staying out until the lights came on. The street lights
came on, and no one really locked their doors because
there didn't seem to be a need for it. Like
I said, it was gated. They had a security I
(05:00):
believe it was the Pinkertons that did security for this
little community, and they basically had their own little police
department in this small town. Wow. So before this night,
there hadn't been a murder in the area in over
thirty years. Wow. Okay, so spoiler alert, someone gets murdered.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Spoiler alert, it's mischief.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Yeah, it's mischief night. And yeah, so one of these
teenagers was fifteen year old Martha Moxley. She was in
the middle of her sophomore year at Greenwich High School.
She had been born, she had been so, she had
been born. She was born in San Francisco in nineteen sixty,
(05:45):
the daughter of David and Dorothy, and they had literally
just transferred from California, like San Francisco, to Connecticut the
prior year. Okay, she had one older brother, John, and
so they were just kind of getting used to life
in bell Haven. Everyone that talked about Martha after her
death said that she was just this super bubbly girl.
(06:09):
You immediately wanted to be friends with her. She was
always smiling, and she became super popular right away. She
had gorgeous long blonde hair and just by everyone like
most of the boys had crushes on her. All the
girls wanted to be your friend type of girl, gotcha, Yeah,
super athletic and wicked smart. One of her friends said
(06:35):
about her afterwards. Martha had this way of making you
laugh even when you didn't feel like it. She just
had that kind of energy.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
So, oh, man, were Martha?
Speaker 1 (06:44):
So during that fall, Martha had started spending time with
these two neighbor boys that were uh, their house was
like across from hers, and these two boys their names
were Thomas and Michael Skaicele. Thomas was the older of
the two, he was seventeen. Michael was the same age
as Martha, fifteen, and there are accounts of them like
(07:08):
going out to get ice cream, and both boys were
interested in Martha. Both boys were also very competitive with
one another. Okay, as boys are teenage boys. The Scalele
family was like it was a wealthy neighborhood, but the
scale family was like above and beyond like wealthy in
this neighborhood. They also had a family connection to the Kennedy's. Ah,
(07:33):
so that's their level, that's their level. They come from
like the Kennedy dynasty, the Russian SCCL, the Russian Scale Senior,
the dad his sister had married Robert Kennedy.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Okay, yeah, so it gives you a little bit of
a preview under that. He also was in charge of
the Great Lakes Carbon Corporation, which was one of the
most profitable industrial companies at that time in the world.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Okay, so they're they're rich rich.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
They come from money, yeah, money, money. Unfortunately, two years
prior their mother Anne had passed away from cancer and Russian.
I don't know if he was an alcoholic before this,
but his wife's death death definitely exacerbated his drinking. He
was rarely home and there were seven children all together
(08:34):
in this household, the scale household. Six of them were
boys and one of them was a girl. So they
were just kind of left of their own vices. It
said most of them struggled with alcoholism. They kind of
like this house was the party house on the block
because there was no supervision. They were typically taken care
of by like nanny's tutors and the like. And it
(08:56):
was kind of like this revolving door of these people
coming in and taking care of them and then you know,
another person would step in.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
And I also feel like when you are working for
such a wealthy and affluent family, as the quote unquote
the help, right, those kids probably walked all over you know.
There wasn't really an authority. They were rich, Yeah brats. Yeah,
speaking of thongs.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Rolling down on my belly, I feel that.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
So.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
Thomas or Tommy, was the second oldest of the sons.
He was super athletic, confident, popular, total jock, and he
did have a reputation for being super aggressive if things
didn't go his way. Oh no, Michael was more even
more troubled. By thirteen. It was said that he had
(09:46):
a severe drinking problem and he would quite frequently go
on benders and I would blackout and also be extremely
aggressive man. He was also said to have been impulsive
and insecure and always seeking approval.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Well if he sounds like he's being raised by his
older brother.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
So that checks. So by nineteen seventy five, this household
had already gotten that reputation in Bellhaven. They were loud kids, unruly,
super prone to wild behavior, and everyone kind of looked
the other way just because they were connected to the
Kennedy family, right, so it kind of made them untouchables,
(10:31):
so they could kind of they could get away with
pretty much anything.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Oh no, I wonder what's gonna happen.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
So Martha had written in her diary a couple of
weeks prior to her murder that these Scica boys she
thought that she really needed to kind of separate herself
from them because Tommy had a way of being very
forward with her and he would just be insistent on
(11:00):
like touching her legs and like just trying to get
her to do things that she was not comfortable with.
Oh no, when I had mentioned they had gone out
for ice cream before, she was kind of sitting in
between Michael and Tommy. But she says in her diary,
She's like, I was basically on his lap during the drive.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
And I'm sure that was by his design.
Speaker 1 (11:22):
Exactly, yeah, exactly. So on Mischief Night, Martha was actually grounded.
She had gone out the previous week and didn't come
home until like two o'clock in the morning, which was
way past her curfew. Her mom at first told her, no,
(11:42):
you can't go out for Misshif night. No, you have
to stay home. You're grounded. Her dad, who seemed to
be more of the enforcer, was out of town on
a business trip in New York at the time, so
she ended up kind of wearing her mom down to
the point where her mom was like, Okay, fine, you
can go out. Did you have a curfew of nine thirty?
And she was like, okay, awesome, thank you. So she
(12:04):
goes out. Her mom so she remembers making her a
girl cheese sandwich before she left, and then right after
that she'd gone over to her friend's house and had
ice cream, and then they ended up at the Scicle residence.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
Oh No.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
A little bit later that night, Dorothy, Martha's mom, had
stayed up October thirtieth and waited up for Martha to
come home once her curfew passed. She was a little
annoyed that Martha once again wasn't following the rules. Her
brother John had arrived home on time, and so he
was kind of like he was always kind of the
(12:39):
bad egg in the family from their from his point
of view, Martha was always seen as the golden child.
So he was like, finally, this one time, like I'm
on time and she's not, and she's in trouble and
I'm not. And uh So at first they're just kind
of like, okay, it's mischief and I maybe she got
a little too drunk and you know, she got carried
a yeah, lost track of time, you know, as we do.
(13:02):
But then as the night got later, like later into
the night, like eleven twelve, Dorothy was like, something is wrong,
Like she wouldn't be this late, like maybe thirty minutes,
maybe forty five minutes. So she starts calling Martha's friends
(13:23):
and some of her own friends too, just to see
if they've seen Martha around. Martha's friends let her know
that the last time they saw her she was at
the scale of Residence hanging out with Tommy and the boys,
and so she's like, Okay, maybe she just is over there.
So she calls over the Scalow residence asks if they've
seen Martha. They say no, and then by by like
(13:46):
three o'clock in the morning, Dorothy's freaking out. She calls
the cops. She lets them know that her daughter is missing.
It's the seventies, it's the seventies. Yeah, so she's like
she's hoping that she just passed out, you know, but
she's really worried and this is typical behavior of her daughter. Surprisingly,
the police immediately start a search.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
I will say money right right, the influence.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
And the influence of money, and they probably had nothing
else going on, you know.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
Because you said it was like a really like there
wasn't a lot of crime, and there there.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
Wasn't a lot of crime, and there had not been
a murder for over thirty years at this point. So
they show up at the house, start peeking around inside,
trying to see if maybe she just passed out in
a different room or you know, maybe came back. They're
asking her friends, like did she stay the night with you? No.
(14:38):
In the morning, Dorothy goes over to the scape of
the residence, knocks on the door, and Michael comes to
the door. She asks, have you seen Martha? He says no.
He says no, and they have like this little travel
travel now they have this little travel trailer off to
the side of the house, and she was like, can
I take a peek in there? Maybe she wandered in
there and passed out, so they peek. She's not there.
(15:02):
Her brother John had also been driving around town trying
to find his sister as well, So he's just going
to all the spots that he thinks that she could be,
doesn't turn up anything, and then he has to go
to uh practice, I think it's for lacrosse. Yeah, rich people, wealthy.
(15:25):
So they're scanning like they're the perimeter. This house is
on five acres to mind you, so they're scanning. They
haven't found anything. Surprisingly, because when you hear about this
crime scene, it's kind of wild to me that they
didn't immediately find a trail of blood. They didn't find
any like parts of the weapon that was used, and
(15:51):
none of this kind of gets pieced together until about
twelve thirty in the afternoon, and this is when one
of her friends, Sheila, is walking through the backyard from
her yard, so they're kind of half adjoining yards. She's
walking through the backyard and she sees what she describes
as just like this lump. I don't know. She's like,
(16:16):
it looks weird. She goes over to further investigate, like
maybe it's a prank or something, and sees that it's
actually the brutally bludgeoned body of Martha.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
Oh my god.
Speaker 1 (16:27):
Martha's pants and underwear had been pulled down to her
knees and she was laying on her stomach, but was
completely unrecognizable, like her hair was stained with so much
blood that they couldn't even tell that she had blonde hair.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Next to the body, there was also a broken golf
club shaft, and not the shaft sorry, she had been
stabbed through the neck with the shaft. So there's the
head of the all club that I'd been used to
brutally beater. The shaft had broken, and so the broken
(17:05):
part of the shaft had been stabbed through her throat.
That's brutal, very brutal, and the grip of the golf
club is missing at this point. So when she gets
to the house, she's like pale as a fucking ghost
and she just looks at Dorothy and she's like, I
(17:26):
found Martha. Instead of Dorothy going to go identify the
body or go look at Martha, her friend, Dorothy's friend,
offers to go and check on her and see if
she's alive, and her friend, once she goes over there,
she immediately puts her hand on Martha's body and it's
ice cold. Yeah, so she's like she's she's been gone
(17:49):
for a while.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
What a horrific scene. And this was just outside you said.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
This was on their property. She had been dragged to
this location underneath the pine tree on the property, which
is like two hundred yards from the front door.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
Oh my god.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
So pretty immediately, this golf club is traced back to
this Scalel family. It has an insignia on it for
and Scalel, so it's literally a monogram of her initials
and it's like a custom set of clubs too, so
it's the six iron. And when they go and look
(18:26):
at the remaining clubs in this golf bag. The six
iron is the only one that's missing. Allegedly, these clubs
had been laying around the backyard of the Scale residence
because they like to hit golf balls in their gigantic yard.
They would just hit them off the back patty or whatever. Okay,
(18:47):
So when you pieced together like where these clubs came
from and who she was last seen with, who do
you think immediately would is the murderer and you're the
forefront of your mind.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
Michael, Tommy, Wait and the mom.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Holy shit, she's the ghost of Anne Scapell Jesus Christ.
So yeah, immediately the case kind of shifts towards Tommy
and Michael as being their primary suspects. But Michael's eliminated
because he he has an alibi that's pretty air tight
by all accounts.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
Really, what could Michael possibly have been doing?
Speaker 1 (19:34):
So when they were hanging out over at the Scale residence,
they had all kind of climbed into this Lincoln town car.
Tommy had not arrived yet, so it was Michael and
Martha and her friends, and Michael and Martha were in
the front. They were listening to music. Tommy ends up
getting into the driver's seat and kind of pushes Martha
(19:55):
over to the middle seat so she's in between Tommy
and Michael. He starts doing the whole grab in her
leg shit and then the two of the older sccal siblings.
So two of the older brothers eventually kick them out
of the car at around nine point thirty and tell
them we're taking our cousin back to his house. We're
going to go watch the premiere of Monty Python and
(20:20):
allegedly cool as yeah. Right as they're leaving, Michael hops
in the car with them and goes to go watch
the movie.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
So his alibi is his brothers for the police able
to verify.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
They all testify that he was with them, so they
gave him the alibi of being with them from about
nine thirty to eleven. Okay, and this is important for
later in the case, so keep that in the back
of your mind. Tommy, however, was seen and Martha's friends
(20:53):
are the ones that kind of give him up. They're
seen making out over by the pool and then and
her friends kind of got uncomfortable with the heavy petting
that was going on between the two of them, and
the last they see of them, they fall over this
fence together into the bushes essentially, and then her friends
(21:16):
are like weirded out, so they're like, we're leaving because
they've been flirting a bunch that night and it just
got to the point where like, okay, this is like
a lot of PDA going on, and we're dipping right.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
I mean, I understand if people are about to start
banging right in front of you, it.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
Is probably to go awkward. It can be very awkward.
So so yeah, so the friends leave at this point,
and it's around nine forty five, so around the same
time that they'd all gotten out of the car, they're
kind of like, all right, see Martha. And from Tommy's testimony,
he says that after that Martha left like she kind
(21:51):
of decided that she that's not what she wanted, so
she decided to go home. She had a curfew. Michael
had also said that he had offered, or he had
invited her to go over to watch Monty Python with them,
but she declined because of her curfew. So she was
being responsible and was heading.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Home, according to them.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
According to them, and then she ends up dead the
next morning on her own property. Okay, So, like I
had mentioned before, she had been dragged to the location
where her body was eventually found. There was a trail
of blood that led from the driveway to the spot
where she was dragged to underneath a tree, which to me,
(22:37):
I don't know, she's a fifteen year old girl, and like,
I don't know, it's just kind of weird to me.
They they say that it was only one person, but
I feel like two people might have been involved in this.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
So they what they think she was walking, somebody hit
her in the back of the o in the club,
dragged her to the tree and finished. Yeah, really started
hammering right.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
Because there there was just a trail of blood from
the driveway to the tree, and then at the tree
there's obviously that's where she spent her last moments, and
there's more blood that's been pulled there.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
That sounds okay, And then she was obviously sexually assaulted
at the tree as well.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
She actually was not sexually assaulted. There was no evidence
of sexual assault. Surprisingly, so people think that I might
have been staged with the pants, with the pants and
the underwear down around her knees, because there was no
evidence of that allegedly.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
Wow, okay.
Speaker 1 (23:44):
The police also did not do a great job of
securing the scene, and one of them went on the
police scanner and was talking about it, and of course
every news outlet within I don't know, hundred miles found
out about this, and we're on the scene, like fly
some shit, Oh my god, what an idiot, right, what
(24:09):
an idiot? And also all these reporters are traps and
neighbors too are trapsing through the crime scene, and it's
not enough. Everyone there. People are taking pictures of her
body and just like kind of like the same thing
that happened in Rebecca because the house case, it was
just like a media frenzy and for whatever reason, people
(24:30):
have the need to take pictures when they really should
not be. It's very disrespectful. When police were canvassing the neighborhood,
neighbors had mentioned a bunch of dogs barking at around
ten pm, like nine thirty tenka, which was kind of odd,
(24:51):
like a lot of the dogs, like sure they would
bark every once in a while, but a lot of
them were freaking out, like very bizarre behavior. And one
lady also said that she had heard like loud voices
and some hollow thumping sounds geez, which is insane to me,
but then the dogs kind of settled down, so they're like,
(25:12):
it's mischief night, probably just some teenagers out doing their thing.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
Well, nothing ever happens there.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
I'm sure what happens there. So they're like obviously not
thinking that it's a brutal, horrific murder exactly. So Tommy
had told them his alibi was basically like, I stayed home.
Martha went and did her thing. She went home. I
stayed home, and I had a book report do, which
this is. This is the weekend. So he's not even
(25:42):
it's not even due the next day. So he's like,
I had a book report, do you? And when they
ask him what he's researching, he says, Abraham Lincoln for
a seventeen I guess. So he's a junior. And just
who's the first president that comes to mind when I
tell you, like a president, When.
Speaker 2 (25:59):
You say president, I'd definitely go George Bush. But that's
because I think about him a lot.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
I wonder how he's doing.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Specifically George w Now watch this drive that guy.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
The guy that almost choked on a pretzel. I remember that,
you know that guy camp with him. When they asked
his teachers about this later, they all were like, no,
like there, we weren't studying any of the presidents at
this point in.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
Time book report and yeah, Abraham.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Abraham Lincoln, okay, sir, which is wild to me. His
so that they had just had a brand new tutor
start that day who had just moved in with them
as well. Kenneth Littleton okay, Kenneth. Kenneth told detectives that
he and Tommy had watched a movie and then Tommy
(26:51):
had gone up to his room to do his report. Okay,
I'm like cool, story, bro, Michael, he lets, He tells detectives. Yeah,
I went over to my cousin's house. I didn't stay
the night there. We watched the Monty Python premiere of
was It World Circus? I can't remember what it's called,
(27:13):
Circus something, the Circus one, And then he returned back
home around eleven o'clock.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
And by the time he got home, everybody was just chilling.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
By the time he got home, everyone was chilling, and
there was everyone was accounted for. There was nothing weird
going on. Martha wasn't there, and he just went right
to bed.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
M okay whole time, pulling the rest of you listeners
out there as well. You are a high school boy
who was not being super fed by anybody. It is
mischief night. All of your friends are partying. Are you
going to bed at.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Ten the party house?
Speaker 2 (27:55):
Yeah too? Are you kidding me? This is ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (27:58):
I know it's not adding up to me.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
Yeah, this is just my personal opinion, allegedly suposedly.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
But so you would think that this six iron would
be like a red herring, like it would definitely lead
them to the Scale boys, at least one of them.
They were both seen with her that night, right you think.
But for some reason, the one part of the golf
club that they could have potentially pulled Prince from the
(28:29):
grip is missing, and so detectives set out to find
this piece of evidence because they feel like it's going
to be the one thing that they can actually have
as solid evidence improving who killed Martha.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
That's my thing, is I'm even think about I mean,
homie said Abraham Lincoln pulling off the grip.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
You also have to think that his he's from money,
and he's also a Kennedy. Right, Oh, there's likely other
people help them cover. That's kind of what I was
thinking covered it anyway. Um, so they go out looking
for the grip, and they're draining ponds nearby. They're also
dragging the little lake that's nearby, and like looking around
(29:17):
anywhere that they can to try and locate this, but
it is never found.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
Oh my god. Okay, so I think I misunderstood. I'm
getting it now. So she was found in her own yard, Yes,
with the freaking golf club from the mock or from
the scalcol Boy's yard. Golf club's from there. She's found
in her own yard. She's been and she's been beaten
with this freaking she's.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
Been beaten with the golf club. And she's also been
dragged from the driveway, which is where she was initially attacked,
pulled into the yard and placed underneath this pine tree.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Okay, yeah, it's this cackle Boys period and a story.
I don't even know why we're here. We're about to find.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
Out that it gets really logo and I mean, I
don't know. We don't have a lot of time, but
I will try to get as far into this as
I can. Russian Senior, because there's a Russian junior. Russian
Senior gets notified of this murder and immediately comes back
from a hunting trip that he'd been away on and
(30:44):
immediately lawyers up and at first he had given police
unfettered access to his kids, like you can question them,
like I know they're not involved type of thing. They
don't get search warrant because of this because they're worried
that it'll be denied essentially, so as long as he's
(31:07):
cooperating with the police, they're like not going to get
a search warrant. They end up having Julius Gaegel, who's
the one daughter of these seven siblings. She is the
one that carries out the search of the house instead
of the police. What in the world, uh huh, Which
(31:28):
I'm just like, how the hell only money, How the
hell did that happen? So she's yeah, she's the one
that goes through the house and is looking for the
grip for this golf club. And that's the only thing
also that they could even get a warrant for, Like
if they're looking for a specific item I guess in
the seventies, that's the only thing that they could use
in a court case if that's what they had asked,
(31:50):
Like that's what they had uh wanted for the search warrant.
So if that's like what they requested for the search
warrant and they found it. Cool, that could be used,
but any other circumstantial evidence could not be used. Wow. Wow,
doesn't make any sense to me. They don't find it, well,
or she doesn't find it.
Speaker 2 (32:11):
I gotta be for real with you. Even if they
did find it.
Speaker 1 (32:14):
She wouldn't have given it up.
Speaker 2 (32:16):
Well yeah, and if their fingerprints around it, they'd be like, well, yeah,
we use it to yeah hip holes all the time.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Exactly. That's true too. That's true too.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
How can they prove unless convenient the fingerprint was on
top of a bloodstain.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
Well, so from from the get go they were looking
outside of the community. They're like, it had been an outsider.
There's no way it was someone from inside of her.
Speaker 2 (32:36):
This reminds me of that Mandy Stavick case. We did
huh where They like, it has to be somebody else,
and the person killed her was within a mile of.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
Her, had exactly exactly, so there's like nothing like this
ever happens. So it's clearly an outsider that somehow got
through security or was visiting for the night. Okay, So
another possibility or another possible sense respect that they brought
up was Ken Littleton because he's literally new to the community. Yeah,
(33:04):
is at Scale residence. He is obviously an outsider. He
had access to the golf clubs, and he also has
a week alibi compared to Michael and Tommy.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
Doesn't he alibi Tommy though.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
He does alibi Tommy.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
But also he's an adult.
Speaker 1 (33:25):
He's an adult. He's twenty three at this point, a
grad student, and after this case, his life kind of unravels.
So if you follow up on Ken Littleton a little
after this, he goes gets into some shit like he's drinking,
taking drugs. He's in and out of jail for like
(33:46):
petty larsony, petty larceny and just these small time crimes.
But he takes a news dive pretty deeply.
Speaker 2 (33:54):
Something traumatized him.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
Also, he has a polygraph taken and fails it twice.
So he's got something that's I.
Speaker 2 (34:06):
Wish we knew exactly what questions it was.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
You know. The ties to the Kennedy is another thing
that investigators have to kind of take into consideration with
this case. Scalele family as obviously very wealthy. They have
a lot of pool in the community and they're not touchable.
(34:28):
Like I had mentioned, before they had kind of been
estranged from the Kennedy family, but still had that connection
and a lot of powerful allies in their circle. What
Dorothy recalls in one of her interviews is that the
next morning a limo pulls up to the Scale residence
(34:53):
and she it looks like some pretty high profile people
will step out and greet Russian and going at the house.
So I don't know that was, but it's kind of weird.
Speaker 2 (35:05):
I mean, who travels by limo? I don't know. I
don't run circles.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
I don't know. I don't love the limo o. Hers
would be cooler.
Speaker 2 (35:14):
Way cooler. Hearse pulls up, I'd be like weird timing, uh,
but sick but dope.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
So after this investigation into Tommy, he also he has
a couple of polygraphs done as well. The first two
are inconclusive and then the third one he passes. They
end up ruling him out as a suspect because of
(35:43):
the polygraphs and because yes, and because he has the
alibi with Ken Littleton. They also rule out Michael because
everyone corroborates his alibi as well, so he's no longer
looked at as a suspect. Ken lion cannot be placed
at the scene of the crime either, so they rule
(36:04):
him out as a suspect. And many people believe at
this point in the community that it was just a
drifter that somehow got into their little gated community, killed
Martha and then took off because they were right by
the freeway.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
No way. Yes, they managed to perpetuate that story.
Speaker 1 (36:21):
They managed to perpetuate that story. And Dorothy even at
Martha's memorial, which was on November fourth, so only like
a week later, not even a week later, she actually
goes up and gives Tommy a hug because she's she
feels bad for him because he's been suspect number one
in this investigation from the get go, and then he's
ruled out as a suspect. That there's no way, there's
(36:44):
no way that he was the one that did this.
So she goes up and gives him a hug. So
technically no one has ever been charged in the murder
of Martha Moxley. Oh my good. No are coming up
on the fiftieth anniversary this year, Oh my god, which
(37:08):
is wild to me. So case goes completely cold for
years and years and years, and then out of nowhere,
In nineteen ninety one, another Kennedy family member is dragged
into the limelight. William Kennedy Smith is facing allegations of
(37:33):
rape involving Patricia Bowman from Palm Beach, Florida, and he
eventually has all of these charges dropped, of course, but
it kind of opens up this can of worms of like,
how do these Kennedy's cousins and whatnot keep getting away
with these atrocious crimes. So people had stopped really talking
(37:57):
about Martha Moxley, but when William Kennedy gets picked up
on this rape charge, they're like, what the hell? Like
they are obviously a very powerful and influential and rich family.
They can't keep getting away with shit like this. And
when the charges dropped, people start returning to Martha Moxley's
(38:21):
case and they're like it had to have been one
of the scale boys. And William is also allegedly at
this party the night that Martha dies, so then they're like,
did he do it? And it was just never mentioned
that he was in town. Turns out that's not true.
He was not in town for this. But it starts
to have like this wheel start ticking in a lot
(38:43):
of investigator like like small time saluts and other detectives.
They start thinking about this case again, and eventually Rushton
is just so fed up with having these accusations against
his sons that he hires his own private investigators to
look into the case, to look into all of like
the the autopsy, to look into all the case notes
(39:07):
that had come up about this, and is just wanting
definitive proof that his sons were not involved in this,
and unfortunately the opposite happens.
Speaker 2 (39:18):
Oh oh oh, bad news.
Speaker 1 (39:21):
But so these investigators end up compiling what later becomes
known as the Seton Report, and they're looking into Michael
and Tommy's alibis, and Michael and Tommy are cooperating because
(39:42):
obviously these people are there to protect them, and their
stories about the night that Martha died start to change
pretty dramatically. At that Michael tells these investigators, these detectives
(40:16):
that he or private investigators. He tells them that actually
he didn't go right to bed after watching Monty Python
with his cousins. Oh, he went over to the Moxley
residence and was throwing rocks at Martha's window, trying to
get her to come outside. So this is placing him
(40:36):
at the scene of the crime. Hmm. He also claims
to climb up into a tree to see if he
can get so he's a peeping tom. Climbs up into
a tree to see if he can get a view
of Martha and starts jerking off. He emits this in
the tree. This is what he admits. He says, he
(40:58):
jerked off to orgasm. You chok about thirty seconds and
he pulls his pants back up, climbs down the tree
and goes home. Why would he admit to this?
Speaker 2 (41:11):
Honestly, I'm I'm shook. Either he thinks that they're going
to find his DNA somewhere or.
Speaker 1 (41:18):
Someone might be able to place him at the scene
of the crime because they've seen him, I know.
Speaker 2 (41:21):
But like no one said anything going into that kind
of detail too him, Like, are you just a chronic oversharer?
Speaker 1 (41:27):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (41:27):
I think so, because I got a lot of goosebumps
from that one. It's gross, really creepy, really creepy that
poor girl did. She was already feeling so pressured.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
Tommy Skegle's story is also Tommy Scgle's story also changes
also also also every time you hear Also in this episode,
and you have to drink water. Drink. Tommy Scagle admits
(41:57):
to the investigators that he actually wasn't completely truthful about
that night. Is either he didn't have the book report
on Abraham Lincoln though. Also he says that he and
Martha spent a little bit more time together that night
and they had masturbated each other to orgasm, so they
(42:18):
had done some heavy petting and didn't have sex, and
of course she was found to still be a virgin
from her autopsy, but he claims that they masturbated each
other to orgasm and then she went home, hm, which
is so weird to me.
Speaker 2 (42:36):
I feel like they just got weirder and weirder the
more they talked, right.
Speaker 1 (42:41):
And I also think that that's another drink you guys.
Speaker 2 (42:47):
Oh y'all are going to be p and three times he.
Speaker 1 (42:53):
Was thinking that his DNA could potentially be found on
her body as well, or they had found evidence of it,
and that's why they were kind of relooking into the case.
So both of these boys are admitting that their DNA
might have been found on Martha's body.
Speaker 2 (43:07):
Now, I mean, you would hope his DNA wouldn't have
been in there if it was I mean the Michael,
the younger one, if he was jacking off on a tree. Yeah,
but that's so weird. That is a weird thing to say.
I agree. And then the boy they had been like
making out and having the heavy, heavy petting session already,
so I'm.
Speaker 1 (43:24):
Like, but not to the point where people what they
were having anything more than just a makeout session. His
DNA would have still been found on her too, because
they'd been swapping spit.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
I don't know. I definitely in my mind, I was like,
there's probably some hands going down some pants and stuff.
Speaker 1 (43:40):
I mean, maybe drink. They're drinking your kid, your kids,
teen stars, horny teenagers taking no for an answer right
that as well, so very pushy. So I think we're
gonna stop here and we'll pick up where we get
to an actual rest and a trial, and there is
(44:03):
all kinds of crazy religious things that are going on.
There's gonna be a little RFK junior appearance. How do
you feel about that.
Speaker 2 (44:13):
Let's stay tuned for that be.
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yeah, and so we'll pick up. Probably it's not until
around the October two thousand where we actually get any
type of an arrest. Wow. So yeah, long time twenty
five years after her murder. Yeah so yeah, okay. If
you guys have any case corrections, if you have any
(44:36):
case recommendations, or you want to suggest a tasty spot
for us to go check out in town, hit us
up on the old Instagram.
Speaker 2 (44:44):
At Scream dot and Dot Sugar dot podcast, Facebook, Scream
and Sugar, True Crime Coffee Hour, TikTok, Scream Dot and
Dot Sugar, Gmail, Scream and Sugar Reno at gmail.
Speaker 1 (44:55):
Dot com, or you can leave us a voicemail.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
At seven seven five three, eight six two one eight
to five.
Speaker 1 (45:01):
Thanks for hanging out with us until next time, Stay
soupie yall.
Speaker 2 (45:05):
Bye bye bye
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