A Mystery in the Martha Moxley Murder

The murder mystery of 15-year old Martha Moxley back on the eve of Halloween in 1975 is what I would consider a semi-well known homicide case. While it doesn’t loom quite as high as those killings of famous unsolved serial killers or cases like that of the murdered wife of prosperous Cleveland doctor Sam Shepperd (whose story served as the basis for the television  program and eventually the Harrison Ford film The Fugitive), it is a case that has kept its head afloat above swift waters. In the early afternoon of October 31, 1975 the body of bouncy and beautiful Martha Moxley was found facedown under a tree only some 200 feet from her Greenwich home. She had been beaten to death and gouged in the through by what would later be determined to be a golf club. The partial remains of a six iron were found right next to and a short distance from the body. Two large puddles of blood were also found over a hundred feet from the body, convincing authorities that she had likely been beaten to death and dragged to a more secluded location. Two of the first officers on the scene even claimed a piece of the club was protruding from Martha’s head when she was discovered (a possible fact that has been vehemently denied by the Greenwich authorities). The reason for this cases still looming in the criminal and public psyche likely is the result of two things. One, unlike many unsolved murder cases, which often gradually fade into the mist of more contemporary issues, the case has continued to resurface with new information. Two, likely most significant, is the cases close connection to the Kennedy family. 

While it still has not been proven beyond any doubt that one or both of them were the killers of the young Moxley, the two, what should have been obvious suspects, Thomas and Michael Skenkel, were members of the prosperous Skenkel family who lived in the posh Belle Haven neighborhood of Greenwich, Connecticut. Rushton, the father of Thomas and Micheal, was the brother of Ethel Kennedy (the wife of Bobby Kennedy), creating a connection between the two powerful families. Even without this powerful political connection, the Skenkel’s were more than stable on their own, at least stable financially. Psychologically, they were another story all together. Rushton had several children, besides Thomas and Michael, as well as a drinking problem. His wife had died a few years before the Moxley slaying, and of all his children, Thomas and Michael were the most difficult to deal with. With no mother around and Rushton more focused on his work and utilizing violence to keep his children in line more than anything else, coupled with their high standing as a prosperous family, which in and of itself provided added pressures, both Thomas and Michael suffered severe emotional issues. However, as is often the case in prosperous families, these issues were covered up and often ignored, allowing them to expand. Both young men, Thomas was seventeen and Michael fifteen at the time of the Moxley slaying, suffered severe mood swings (believed to be the case of borderline personality or bipolar problems) and were always in competition with each other. Sometimes their competitiveness would thrust the two into physical violence towards each other that at times became harsh enough to scare everyone in the house.

While both young men suffered psychological issues that were often ignored, it was clear that Michael’s issues went much deeper than Thomas. Anyone close to the family, when asked about their potential in having killed the fifteen-year old Moxley, would express certainty as to Thomas’ innocence but would tip their hat in the case of young Michael. Mildred Ix, neighbor and best friends with Martha’s mother Dorthy as well as neighbors with the Skenkel family went to far as to express to Dorthy, “I just don’t think Tommy [Thomas] could do it. But Michael, I’d give you Michael in a minute” (Fuhrman 297). Later examinations showed that while the two brothers suffered similar personal afflictions, one characteristic Michael possessed that went practically unseen in Thomas was deep-seeded violent tendencies; tendencies that had likely only been held back by young Michael simply through consistent repression. Further examinations of the young man, who spent over a decade in and out of hospitals and sanitariums, found that much of his aggression in life had a strong base in aggression towards women. He was found to have grave hostilities against his mother and according to those in the know, it was well-known that Michael and Martha had been in a relationship together shortly before her death. 

It is also known that Thomas had also been pursuing a relationship with their attractive next door neighbor. According to the family, this instigated several further fights between the two young men, both pining for the same girl. It is also known that the last time Martha was seen alive she was in the company of Thomas. During this time Thomas had been attempting to make sexual advances towards her, advances she resisted initially. Thomas claimed that they engaged in sexual activity for a brief period of time before she, Martha, accompanied him to his home, quite possibly to continue their sexual ventures together. What occurred after that is a little hazy, but all that is known for absolutely certain is that shortly before Martha’s death she was seen in the company of Thomas. Furthermore, Martha’s death was the result of being beaten and stabbed to death with a, presumably broken, golf club. This club was tied back to the Skenkel’s. This was a hardly significant fact in the case, but many people in the neighborhood tried to fend this point off by saying that lots of people in the neighborhood left items they owned outside (because there was security officers monitoring the entry to Belle Haven they likely didn’t feel the need to worry that their items would be stolen; then again they were all so wealthy they likely didn’t care much if these items were stolen either). 

If all the pieces are put together in a particularly way one can possibly argue that Martha refused Thomas’ advancements and that he killed her in a fit of anger at being rejected. Again though, amidst his conflicted background, there was nothing in Thomas’ psyche that suggested he had any aggression towards women whatsoever (again, the one great disparaging point between Michael and him). With the potential for hostility against women, Michael could have found a motive in killing Martha after either seeing or learning that she had been not only flirtatious with his brother (of all other people), but had also become physically/sexually active with him. For years, Michael was never considered as a suspect because he supposedly had an alibi that he was at a friends home when the killing occurred. However, years later he would change this story and tell a new one, in which he incriminated himself more than clearing himself. Even had he not changed his new story, his alibi was anything but airtight. Others in the house he supposedly had gone to the night Martha was killed had no memory of seeing him there. The simple truth is, with both Thomas and Michael being members of a prestigious family and their complete lack of experience dealing with homicide cases, the Greenwich police, who more than botched the case,  treated both young men with kid gloves. When Michael’s alibi came out they simply assumed it to be accurate and asked no further questions about it. They had no problem pursuing various other people who they should have known weren’t legitimate suspects within two minutes of speaking to them. Furthermore, authorities tried to put the murder somewhere between 9:35 and 10:00 p.m. the night of October 30th. This time frame was likely reached because the time in which Martha was last seen with Thomas Skankel was at approximately 9:30. Thomas also put the conclusion of his time with Martha at around 9:50 to 9:55 p.m.  He then said that they parted ways and the last he saw of her she was walking towards her house. Martha’s home was more or less just kitty cornered from the Skenkel’s residence. 

Michael’s alibi had him away from Belle Haven from roughly the time of 8:45 until 11:20 p.m., and thus he was gone when the killing occurred. However, with how poorly the police investigation was conducted, proper examination of Martha’s body to see how long she had been dead was not undertake as it should have. Thus her exact time of death loomed as having possibly occurred as late a 1 a.m. on October 31st. Whatever the case may be, when Michael changed his story years after the murder, he initially had himself arriving at home around 11:20, at which time he went straight to bed. However, in his new story, he claims that shortly after returning home he went out to peep into the window of a woman in the neighborhood. As this crooked new story goes, Michael went to peep on this woman, but when he saw that she wasn’t dressed in the nude, as she apparently often was, he left and climbed up a tree outside of Martha’s house to try and get her attention. He apparently yelled towards her room but got no answer. In by far the most flabbergasting aspect of his story, Michael then claimed that he masturbated to Martha in the tree before climbing down out of it and returning towards home. On his way he claimed that he felt someone was watching him and yelled out to them. He even picked an “object” up and threw it towards a tree where he thought someone may be located. At that he began running towards home. Despite this relatively brief collection of events, Michael claimed that this all took place over the course of about fifty minutes (11:40 p.m. to 12:30 a.m.)

There are many intriguing aspects to this new story that cast more light on Michael as the possible (and even probably) assailant. First of all, it is of interest to mention that it was the early 1990s when Michael came out with this new story, at which time DNA evidence had only recently become a mainstream thing. It is known that trace amounts of DNA were recovered from the crime scene. With this fact firmly established, it is of intrigue that Michael would tell such an outlandish story, whether or not it was true, as to what he did after “returning home”. Many skeptics believe that Michael fabricated the story of climbing up Martha’s tree and masturbating as a way to cover in case any of his semen were recovered near the crime scene. Had he not attempted some sexually-driven attack on Martha, or even more disturbing, gauged some sexual pleasure in killing her, for what reason would he have to express that he had masturbated near Martha’s home (and near the site of her death). This being said, there was no evidence whatsoever that the killer had sexually assaulted Martha shortly before or after her death. The only evidence to suggest such a thing is the fact that Martha’s body was found with her pants pulled down (suggesting the killer may have had plans to assault her but either gave up, couldn’t perform, or was scared away). 

Something Mark Fuhrman put forth in his book was how well Michael’s descriptions of what occurred could have coincided with his actions had he been the killer. Notably, his explanation of having thought someone was following him, to which he picked something up and hurled it near a tree. It is known that Martha had been beaten and stabbed with a golf club and her body abandoned near a tree. One has to wonder if Michael’s claim of heaving something towards a tree may have been to cover himself had someone seen him heaving a golf club at Martha near a tree. At the conclusion of his story, Michael claims he rushed home, but was locked out, and thus had to climb up the side of the house to get in by way of his bedroom. It was well-known in Belle Haven that the Skenkel’s never locked their doors (again, they likely felt no real need to). However, had Michael just beaten young Martha to death he most likely would have been covered in blood at some level, which would have made him a fool to wander right through the main door of his home. He, instead would have taken a discrete route to his room where he would have gone unseen. Again, there is reason to believe this story was a fabrication on the part of Michael to try and protect himself in the case that something came out to make him look more like the primary suspect.

Whatever the case, anyone who has looked into the Martha Moxley murder case with an objective mind has reached the conclusion that the only real reliable suspects are either Thomas or Michael Skenkel. They also all fall on the theory that Michael was most likely the killer. This was only bolstered by his shattered alibi and the fact that the killing didn’t necessary occur before he supposedly returned home from his visit to a neighbor’s home. Unfortunately, with how poorly the investigation was conducted, there is very little evidence and it’s extremely difficult to say exactly what happened and who is the sure killer. While in the process of reading up and looking into this case myself a little question began to develop in the back of my mind. Upon reading when Martha was killed and how long it took for her body to be discovered, this questions kept clung to my mind as I read, hoping that it would be addressed at some point or another. However, with what I have read, I have still yet to obtain a satisfactory answer to this question. Furthermore, I haven’t even seen the issue posed by anyone who has investigated this already deeply suspicious murder case.

Let’s just run with the theory that Michael Skenkel was Martha Moxley’s killer. He kills her some time, likely between 10 p.m. and midnight, whatever the exact time was, the truth is that it was likely more than twelve hours before her body was first seen (by neighbor Sheila McGuire; discovered the body at approximately 12:15 p.m. on October 31st). Dorthy Moxley, Martha’s mother, took notice of her daughters absence as early as 11:20 p.m. when her soon John returned home (presumably from the same location as Michael). Upon hearing that Martha had not returned home, he went out again and searched around Belle Haven looking for her. This would be one of two searches he conducted. The second search had him away from home from approximately 3:35 to 6:00 a.m. His first search lasted over an hour, meaning that over the course of nearly four hours of searching he never found his sisters body only 200 or so feet away from their house. Dorthy contacted the police, who as early as 4:00 a.m. began a search all over the Moxley property and around Belle Haven. This search lasted for several hours, lasting into the early hours of sunrise. Several officers were conducting vehicle searches around Belle Haven as well. Dorthy herself was contacting and visiting neighbors as well to find out if they had seen anything.

Despite all of this searching going on, over several hours and involving several officers of the law, nobody uncovered Martha’s body, who was literally in visual distance from her own bedroom. While it appears the killer made an effort to move the body to a more hidden area, she was still pretty much abandoned under a tree. It only makes sense that the focus of the search by anyone would be near her own home, where it would branch out. I find it incomprehensible that with all of this early hysteria and all of this search work being conducted that wiped all the way across the Belle Haven neighborhood that not a single soul would have seen her body, which was right there under their noses. Instead, we must believe that amidst nearly twelve hours of searching, that Martha’s body was stumbled onto by chance by a neighbor walking along. Sure it was dark during most of this search, but I hardly see that as an excuse, especially considering the fact that there were police officers involved in this search. 

Furthermore, Martha’s body was not the only thing discovered there. Two large pools of blood were also found along with three piece of a broken six iron (the murder weapon). These items too went unfound by anyone. Around 9:30 a.m. on October 31st Dorthy went and visited the Skankel home to ask if anyone there had seen Martha. The most logical route to the Skankel home would have had her walking within ten to twenty feet of two pieces of the broken club, of which more of Martha’s blood was also discovered. She only called her other next door neighbors, the Hammond’s, to see if they had seen her. Had she also walked over to the Hammond’s home, from her own, to ask about Martha, she would have practically had to walk right through the pools of her daughters own blood to get there, she was that close! 

No matter what anyone’s investigation has bore out and no matter what one believes as far as who killed Martha and when it occurred, I cannot look at this great stretch in time, time in which numerous people were conducting numerous searches right on top of where Martha was supposedly abandoned, and believe that her body had been there all that time. I am not claiming this to be fact. Obviously I wasn’t there and thus am in no place to stroke my ego and say I know 100 percent. That being said, for my own opinion, I do not believe the official line that Martha Moxley was killed in the late evening of October 30th and that her body laid unfound for possibly as many as fourteen hours without being seen. I simply cannot believe that. Had her body been stashed in some bushes maybe I could stretch my logic out enough to believe that, but she had been modestly left under a tree.

This is a prevailing point to me as well, and I feel it supports what I honestly believe as far as what happened to Martha Moxley. This point is that her body appears to have been attacked at one place and then dragged to another location. The only reasoning here is that the killer wanted to hide the body. If that were the case then why would he do such a crappy job hiding it. He just dragged it a short distance and abandoned it under a tree where it could have easily been found. The possibility looms that the killer may have intended to hide the body in a ore inconspicuous location but possibly heard a neighbor or something and got scared off. That’s a definite possibility. Another possibility however is that the body may have been situated in such a way to create an apparent crime scene in which it looked like the body was killed in one place and then dragged and hidden in another. 

Now of course, calling what is officially known into question always balances one on the edge of conspiracy. I’m not trying to create some outlandish conspiracy theory here, I’m not trying to show off my wondrous talents and brilliance by coming up with some grandiose and probably unlikely conclusion to an unsolved murder case (trust me, I’ve seen enough jackasses try and do that in the case of John F. Kennedy’s killing). This is merely a discussing; an effort to try and reach some understanding with regards to a point that I feel had been neglected and needs to be addressed. I personally do not believe that Martha’s body was lying under that tree as long as the official investigation states, which means she was eventually put there. Such would make sense as to why it took so long for neighbors and the authorities to find something that was right there. With the fact that the authorities botched the investigation the way they did, which included moving the body around before it had been properly checked and not taking a single crime scene photograph, it’s not a far step in any circumstance really to suggest that an aspect of the crime was completely incorrect and that Martha’s body was not just lying there all night.

There are other aspects that add to this idea that Martha was likely killed elsewhere and then had her body placed there at some time when nobody was looking. There appears to have been a lull in the search between 10 a.m. and when the body was found around 12:15 on October 31st. This could have been when the body and the evidence was placed. There is already the poor manner in which her body was supposedly hidden. If someone wants to make it look like someone made an effort to hide something, but at the same time they want that something to be found, they compromise and just do a crappy job of hiding that something. Another JFK assassination correlation could be the fact that the accused assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, managed to stash his weapon in a location that had to be searched three times before it was found. At the same time, he conveniently left the three shells from the bullets he officially fired right under the window where he supposedly fired them from. Again, a convenient suspect (whom I don’t believe did it), who conveniently left significant evidence right there to be found. Another example close to this is the case of James Earl Ray, who spent his final days in prison, convicted of the murder of Martin Luther King, Jr. Ray is another “guilty” man who I don’t believe committed the crime he was convicted for. According to the official story, after shooting King, he fled the halfway house he was staying in in his Mustang, but in the process left a bundle of his belongings right out in front of the house to be found. Included in this package, of course, was the rifle he was accused of using to kill King. Now I am not claiming that the murder of 15-year old Martha Moxley was a covert, governmental cover-up, or a murder case that parallels the public significance of JFK and MLK’s, but rather I am just making a connection between the way some people do things. If someone wanted Martha’s body to look like it had been hidden, but wanted her to ultimately be discovered at the same time, they would have stashed her in a poor location where she would have been found. Regardless of what anyone says, I believe this possibility is much more likely that several neighbors and police officers practically stepping right over her body without notice.

Another interesting aspect is the piece of golf club that were found. Everyone who has examined the case as it has been expressed, believes that the golf club was a weapon of convenience, used by someone who maybe didn’t have the intention initially of killing Martha. But when the moment came they grabbed the first thing they could get. If this is the case, then Martha Moxley’s murder was not a planned event, but rather a spur of the moment attack. The killer was not prepared. I find it very difficult to believe then that not a single fingerprint was found on any of the pieces of the golf club. If either Thomas or Michael Skankel, or even a transient for that matter (the police honestly pushed the notion that a wandering transient, in a secured community, was a more likely killer than the Skankel boys) had been guilty of this crime, especially if it was a rage-filled, incoherent, savage attack, none of them would’ve had the foresight to wipe the club for prints. So, much like the rifle Lee Harvey Oswald supposedly used to shoot JFK, we have a murder weapon with none of killers prints on it (Oswald’s smudged palm print was later found on the rifle after agents took his prints in the mortuary where his dead body was being kept). 

A point was made in Mark Fuhrman’s book on the case about how the police took to such painstaking efforts to find a portion of the club that was never found (approximately twenty inches of the shaft). Fuhrman made the claim that this was a pointless pursuit and that it wouldn’t have made any difference in the long run, which in terms of the case as the way we understanding it right now is true. He also makes the point that maybe there wasn’t a whole golf club there to begin with, but just the portions that were found out there. I find this a little hard to believe, that from a set that belonged to the wealthy Skankel family, of which all the other clubs were in complete condition, that Thomas or Michael would have grabbed, or even found a club in which a portion of it was missing. I personally believe that uncovered that final piece of the club is somewhat significant, but for different reasons than the one’s Fuhrman used to deem it insignificant. Again, if the argument is being made that Martha’s body was placed at this location rather than the killing having necessary occurred there, the question of a complete club is highly significant. It’s outlandish in any way to believe the killer used an already broken club. Certain, if the attack were vicious enough, the club could have broke, but that doesn’t change the fact that had the whole attack occurred right there, it stands to reason that all of the pieces of the club would have been found. What kind of a moron would make sure to take away a portion of the shaft with him, to keep it from being discovered, but then leave two little pieces near a pool of blood and a larger piece right there next to the larger pool of blood. 

Again, it’s a little hard to believe that in broad daylight, with an ongoing search being conducted that someone could have slipped in, planted this blood, the pieces of the golf club and a whole human body, but one has to look at the conflicting manner in which the case was handled. In all honestly, the concept of power cannot be ignored here. Everyone knows money has bought the lives and deaths of people in our country. It’s sad but it happens and the more authority one person or group has the easier it is for them to get away with breaking the law. This doesn’t mean obviously that it happens every second of every day or that everyone who had money and power has people killed. But one must look at the Skankel family as a whole, a family filled with trouble and instability. Beyond them, there was the inept Greenwich police force, who botched the case in every way they could. They also treated Thomas and Michael Skenkel with kid gloves, avoiding even really suggesting them as suspects until they no longer had a choice. It is absurd that they wouldn’t have been suspects from day one since the killing, as it appears to have occurred, happened almost right between their house and the Moxley’s house, Thomas was the last person seen with Martha when she was alive, and the golf club used to do the killing belonged to the Skankel family. It is also of intrigue that in the years following the killings, the Skankel family did the best they could to protect and shelter both Thomas and Michael from public and police scrutiny. With all of this conflict it’s hard to swallow any details in the Moxley killing as absolute truth. And with the suspicious manner in which the Skankel’s were written off by the police, a family with money, coupled with the fact that many people directly involved in investigating this case won’t even talk about it if the issue of the Skankel’s involvement is even suggested. Since the killing they have all hidden themselves behind a wall of power and attorney’s, that not only makes my suspicion towards them grow, but makes it all the more believable to me that the manner in which Martha Moxley official died is an alteration compared to what really happened. 

As is the case with Lee Harvey Oswald (whom I do not believe shot JFK, but whom I definitely believe was connected to whoever did - otherwise, why would he have been chosen to be the fall guy), while I don’t think the official story is the gospel truth of what happened, that definitely doesn’t make me think then that there is no guilt to lay at the Skankel’s feet. There can be little doubt that she was killed by a golf club, if not the one of which pieces were discovered at the crime scene; even Martha’s autopsy showed that she had been killed by a golf club. In suggesting the possibility that Martha may have been killed elsewhere and later placed where she was found, it makes much more sense then that the whole golf club may have not been found there. With the crime scene pre set, They just needed a few broken piece of a club and some compromised, inexperienced police officers to botch the whole thing. If this were really the case of a suddenly attack, even had the club been broken, it’s more than likely that all the pieces of it would have been recovered. No shaft was ever found in the Skankel home, which openly let authorities search after the killing (no doubt the search was not conducted as harshly as other police searches). 

Again, I am not going to sit here and tell everyone exactly what happened, because none of us knows for sure. My point here is certainly not to go into an incoherent rambling as to the many possible other ways and means that Martha Moxley’s life was taken from her because I probably wouldn’t have any evidence to back any of those possibilities up. All I know personally, is that there’s no way Martha’s body could have been sitting there as long as it was with nobody finding it. This is only expounded upon when the broken club pieces and pools of her blood are taken into consideration. Conversely, there are aspects to the killing that it makes a little hard to believe that it may have been set up, most significantly to me, is the idea that she was dragged face first on the ground from the attack site to the tree she was abandoned under. She had marks on her face to back up that she had been dragged and there were markings made in the ground that showed the path she was drug. Now had she been killed another way, it seems almost inhumane to believe that they didn’t just find a spot and stick her there, but rather felt the need for overkill and to drag her, face first, across the yard. Then again, in dealing with people with power or people who have something to hide, often, unfortunate though it is, they will often do whatever it takes. Therefore, if it made the crime scene look the way they wanted it to, they would have done that. Perhaps an effort was made to make it look like some heartless weirdo or transient had done it, and those they would have done whatever they pleased with the body (remember, the authorities did push the idea of a transient being the killer even though there was no evidence to back up such a possibility). In most respects, the crime scene looks like a legitimate one; something hard to fabricate. But again, the whole case was poorly handled, and since no crime scene photographs were taken (another absurdity and violation of proper police procedure), it’s impossible to say how accurate these depictions of the crime scene were. Even in his book on the case, Mark Fuhrman only had drawings prepared of the crime scene to use because there were no actual photos to use. Furthermore, the accounts of the various people there, be they police or people from the neighborhood, vary so much it’s hard to say what was and wasn’t real. All of this understood, it’s very possible that the official outline of the crime scene is inaccurate and that possibly it was a little more mixed up than we know. Again, it’s almost impossible to say because there are no crime scene photographs to solidify any one perspective about what happened. 

Had Martha been killed right there as well, only a short distance from her home, right in the middle of her neighborhood, this would have had to been the works of someone unstable, who would be so insane as to commit a crime right there, risking the incredible likelihood of being caught. With the fact that Martha had been beat several times, it seems she would have had at least a moment or two to struggle and scream for help. While a few people in the neighborhood recalled hearing some “commotion”, nobody recalled hearing anything they could directly corroborate as being the sounds of someone being attacked. But it seems so unlikely that Martha wouldn’t have at least got a scream or two out, but there was nothing. Had there been a scream someone would have heard it and someone would have been out there. With the fact that this vicious crime occurred literally in the middle of a residential neighborhood, practically between two houses, and nobody saw or heard a thing, is another thing I find difficult to believe. Now possibly Martha was struck in the head with the first blow, and she went down unconscious allowing the killer to finish her off quickly. But even then, to attack someone right there, right next to her home, would have been risky, and honestly, quite stupid. And this ties in well with my believe that Martha’s body was somewhere else. With everything that transpired we are to believe that nobody saw Martha between 9:30 p.m. on October 30 and 12:15 p.m. the next day and the whole time she was located right next to her house? I can’t believe that at all, and I find it much more likely that Martha had been either grabbed or possibly went with someone she knew to another location, maybe even a location that was still right there in Belle Haven. I almost lean towards her being snatched, possibly by someone who took issue with the Skankel’s in some way and wanted to get them in trouble. The idea seems a little far-fetched, but not too much. Someone discovered two of the Skankel boys are interested, even sexually active with this girl next door. So they get a hold of one of their golf clubs, which they use as the murder weapon, because in any legitimate murder case, if someone is murdered with a golf club that belongs to a specific someone, that someone immediately becomes at least a person of interest, if not a suspect. So this may have been someone who fanned a friendship with the Skankel’s, fanned it enough to get into their home and snatch an item of convenience, like a golf club. When the authorities searched the Skankel home with regards to matching the golf club murder weapon, they found that all the family’s clubs were loosely stashed in an off room, meaning they didn’t really monitor them well. Such would have made a perfect grab, a meaningless six iron gets snatched from a collection of clubs that the family wouldn’t miss. They have a victim that could, hopefully, be tied to two of the Skankel children, and a murder weapon that can be tied back to their family. Every bit as much as the golf club belonging to the Skankel’s could legitimately implicate them, it could also be used to falsely implicate them. When one thinks this theory over it’s not completely without basis. That being said, even though I am posing it as a possibility, I have not conducted research into this area, if there is any evidence to be uncovered. I am merely positing another possibility regarding the killing of Martha Moxley, in which she could have been snatched up quick without making much noise, then been killed elsewhere and later placed back on location somewhere between her home and the Skankel’s home. If something along these lines occurred, then it makes sense as to why it took so long for her body to be uncovered... because it wasn’t there!