09/26/11 Greenwich Events - It Is Going To Be A Busy Week In Town

Monday

The American Red Cross will host the annual Red Cross Golf Classic at 10 a.m. Sept. 26 at the Greenwich Country Club. Registration will begin at 10 a.m. and lunch at 11:30 a.m. The shotgun start will begin at 1 p.m. Golfers will have the chance to win cash prizes. The tournament will be followed by an awards cocktail and buffet reception at 5:30 p.m. For more information, visit www.greenwichredcross.org or call 203-869-8444.

Tuesday

The Greenwich Land Trust will join with Wildlife In Crisis to release a rehabilitated red fox at 4 p.m. Sept. 27 at the 6.7-acre Agnew Apple Orchard. The Agnew Orchard features heirloom variety apples that were grafted to existing trees several years ago. Help plant an apple tree, learn about the apple grafting process, and watch a rehabilitated fox explore this permanently protected land for the first time. The outing is free and open to the community. Space is limited. To reserve a spot, email Jacinta Mullins at Jacinta@gltrust.org.

The Alliance Francaise of Greenwich will host a “Cocktail de Rentrée” from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Sept. 27 at the Bruce Museum, located at 1 Museum Drive. The event will include hor d’oeuvres, wine, private tours of “Picasso’s Vollard Suite: The Sculptor’s Studio” and “Drawings by Rembrant, his Students and Circle,” and a raffle for two VIP tickets to Focus on French Cinema 2012. The event is free to members, $10 for non-members or 20 percent off membership Sept. 27 only. RSVP to Rebecca Kurish by Sept. 22 at 203-629-1340 or info@afgreenwich.org.

The Greenwich Chamber of Commerce will feature Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., as its speaker at the Update from Washington luncheon to be held at 11:30 a.m. Sept. 27 at the Hyatt Regency Greenwich. Limited tickets are available. The cost is $50 for members and $65 for non-members. To register, email info@greenwichchamber.com or call 203-869-3500. The event is co-sponsored by Young Professionals Group.


The League of Women Voters of Greenwich invites the public to a debate between the candidates for tax collector: Republican incumbent Tod Laudonia and Democrat Bill Grad. The debate will take place from 8 to 9 p.m. Sept. 27 in the Cone Room of Town Hall, 101 Field Point Road. The moderator will be Charlotte Garrell from Fairfield, and the candidates will respond to questions from the audience.

Congressman Jim Himes will speak at the Round Hill Association meeting Sept. 27 at the Round Hill Community House, located at 397 Round Hill Road. Himes will present an inside look at the new proposals for job creation, the debt reduction “supercommittee” and what the future holds for Social Security and Medicare. In addition, Douglas Serafin, director of the Greenwich Department of Health’s laboratory, will present a program on well water safety and water testing. Representatives from CL&P will present a brief update on improvements to the electric grid over the summer and responses to hurricane Irene. There will be a time for attendees to ask questions after each speaker’s presentation. The event will begin at 6:30 p.m., with the program starting at 7 p.m. The forum is open to RHA members, neighbors and friends.

To prepare for the upcoming flu season, the Greenwich Department of Health has scheduled four flu vaccination clinics for people ages 9 and older. The first will be held from 2 to 6 p.m. Sept. 27 at the Eastern Greenwich Civic Center, 90 Harding Road. There will also be a clinic from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. during the Oct. 6 Senior Health Fair at the Eastern Greenwich Civic Center. There will be a clinic at Town Hall from 2 to 6 p.m. Oct. 12, and the last will be held at the Bendheim Western Greenwich Civic Center, 449 Pemberwick Road, from 3 to 6 p.m. on Oct. 26. The vaccinations cost $32, payable by cash or check, and people 65 and older must bring their Connecticut Medicare Part B card. Pneumonia vaccines will also be available for $50. Call 203-622-3774 prior to attending.

The ONS Foundation for Clinical Research & Education will present “Running Right! Injury Prevention for Runners” at 7 p.m. Sept. 27 at the foundation, located at #6 in Greenwich Office Park, 10 Valley Drive. Sports medicine physician and runner Dr. Gloria Cohen will teach how to recognize and avoid the most common injuries associated with running. Physical therapist Abigail Ramsey will discuss stretching and strengthening conditioning for runners, safe training methods, physical therapy injury treatments and returning to running after an injury. Presenters will also include running shoe specialist Chris Goslin from Greenwich Running Co. The seminar is free. Registration is required and begins at 6:30 p.m. For more information or to register, call 203-869-3131.

Wednesday

The Greenwich Retired Men’s Association will host Patrick Sciarratta, executive director of Friendship Ambassadors Foundation, at 11:15 a.m. Sept. 28 at the First Presbyterian Church, located at 18 Lafayette Place. Sciarratta has served as the foundation’s executive director since 1993. The foundation has a staff of five in Greenwich and a second office in Budapest, Hungary. The presentation is open to the public. For more information, call John deCsepel at 203-637-2393 or Peter Schieferdecker at 203-622-0191.

Friday

The Greenwich Tree Conservancy, the Greenwich Arts Council and the Garden Education Center are sponsoring a site-specific art exhibit featuring trees at the Montgomery Pinetum. The opening reception for this show will take place from 6 to 8 p.m. Sept. 30 at the Garden Education Center. Refreshments will be served. Each of 11 artists represented in the show were asked to base their work on one tree in the pinetum. Those attending the reception will be given a printed map locating the specific trees that inspired each artist’s work. The artworks will be on sale and exhibited throughout October. Parking is available. For more information, email treeconserv@optonline.net.

Saturday

Diamond Hill United Methodist Church will host a chili cook-off challenge from 3 to 6 p.m. Oct. 1. Admission is $5. All proceeds are to benefit the Neighbor to Neighbor Food Bank. To enter your chili, call 203-869-2395 or email cawill@optonline.net.

The 13th annual Hawk Festival and Green Bazaar will be held from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Oct. 1 and 2 at the Greenwich Audubon, located at 613 Riversville Road. The outdoor festival regularly attracts 2,000 or more visitors from across Westchester, Fairfield, and Putnam counties. Space at the festival is limited and reservations are on a first-come first-served basis. To secure a booth space, fill an online registration and mail a check (if applicable). For more information, call Audubon at 203-869-5272.

The Bruce Museum will present a symposium on Dutch master Rembrandt van Rijn from 1 to 4 p.m. Oct. 1 at the museum, located at 1 Museum Drive. The symposium, open to the public, features a series of three lectures followed by a panel discussion on Rembrandt and Rembrandt School drawings. The event is organized by the museum in conjunction with the exhibition “Drawings by Rembrandt, his Students and Circle from the Maida and George Abrams Collection,” which runs Sept. 24 through Jan. 8. Reservations and advance payment are strongly suggested. Bruce Museum members $15, non-members $20. Please call the museum at 203-869-0376 or email info@brucemuseum.org.

The work of artists Bryan Nash Gill and Sally Frank will be presented at the Kiernan Hall Nature Art Gallery at Audubon Greenwich Oct. 1 through 30. “Trees: Inside and Out” is an exhibition of monotypes, lithographs and relief prints that presents a portrait of one of nature’s most fundamental elements. A reception for the exhibition will take place from 3 to 5 p.m. Oct. 9. For more information, call Audubon Greenwich at 203-869-5272.

Sunday

The Old Greenwich Riverside Community Center will hold the 49th annual Model Sailboat Regatta at 2 p.m. Oct. 2 in Binney Park. Races are split into nine divisions. Trophies are awarded to top three finishers of each division. Check in begins at 1 p.m. For further questions, call 203-637-3659.

The Greenwich Japanese School Parent Teacher Association will hold a Japanese Culture Festival from 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Oct. 2 at the Greenwich Japanese School, located at 270 Lake Ave. The Japanese culture fair will include a tea ceremony, kendo and karate demonstrations, as well as games, book, goods and food sales, a raffle, and an opportunity to try on a kimono. The raffle includes an i-Pod nano, Nintendo 3DS, restaurant vouchers, a digital camera, laptop and more. The event is raine or shine. Admission is free and parking will be available. For more information, contact the PTA at bunkafest2011@yahoo.co.jp.

The Round Hill Community Church choir, soloists, and guest instrumentalists will present portions from the St. Matthew Passion and the Cantatas during the 10 a.m. World Communion Service Oct. 2. Jenna Hintz will sing “Schlummert Ein” (Falling to Rest) from Cantata 82. Patrick Hogan will be joined by the choir in “I’ll Stand by Jesus Watching” from the St. Matthew Passion. The church is located at 395 Round Hill Road. All are welcome. For information, call 203-869-1091.

JCC Greenwich will broadcast “Live from New York’s 92nd Street Y” at 8 p.m. Oct. 2 at the Boys & Girls Club of Greenwich, 4 Horseneck Lane. In a program broadcast live from New York City via satellite, former governor of New York Eliot Spitzer and Alan Dershowitz, Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, will discuss “Middle East Headlines: A Turning Point for the Middle East and the World.” Dershowitz is the author of many books, including “The Case for Israel,” “The Case for Peace” and, most recently, “The Trials of Zion.” Tickets, $18, can be purchased at jccgreenwich.org or via mail at JCC Greenwich, One Holly Hill Lane, Greenwich, CT 06830. This lecture is endowed by the Edythe Kenner Foundation.

The Bruce Museum will present “The Prints of Martin Lewis: From the Collection of Dr. Dorrance Kelly” Oct. 2 through Feb. 19. Lewis (1881-1962) is recognized as one of the premier American printmakers of the first half of the 20th-century. The exhibition features more than thirty etchings and several canceled plates by the artist from the private collection of Dr. Dorrance Kelly of West Redding. The Bruce Museum is located at 1 Museum Drive. General admission is $7 adults, $6 seniors and students, and free for children under five and Bruce Museum members. Free admission to all on Tuesdays.

The 13th annual Hawk Festival and Green Bazaar will be held from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Oct. 1 and 2 at the Greenwich Audubon, located at 613 Riversville Road. The outdoor festival regularly attracts 2,000 or more visitors from across Westchester, Fairfield, and Putnam counties. Space at the festival is limited and reservations are on a first-come first-served basis. To secure a booth space, fill an online registration and mail a check (if applicable). For more information, call Audubon at 203-869-5272.

Ongoing

The Greenwich Art Society invites the public to the annual faculty exhibition, showcasing the art works of its Studio School faculty. This is an opportunity for the community to view the diverse art works that the Greenwich Art Society Faculty creates. The faculty consists of professional and experienced teachers and artists. The art includes a variety of media representing the range of courses that are being taught — including drawing, oil and acrylic painting, monotype, collage, and sculpture. Open Aug. 30 through Sept. 30 at the Greenwich Art Society Gallery, second floor, Old Town Hall, 299 Greenwich Ave. Hours are Weekdays 10 to 5, Saturday 12 to 5, Sunday 12 to 4. The fall term begins on Sept. 15.

The Bruce Museum will present the exhibition “Bijoux: The Origins and Impact of Jewelry” from July 16 through Feb. 26. The exhibition features an array of different types of jewelry, as well as samplings of minerals, precious stones and other materials from which artists have created an infinite variety of human adornment. The exhibition investigates the wide range of materials used to make jewelry, delves into the genesis of these natural materials, and explores the economic and environmental impact of our universal attraction to sparkle. The jewelry on display comes from all over the globe, including Myanmar and India. For more information, visit www.brucemuseum.org.

The Bruce Museum will feature etchings by Pablo Picasso in “Picasso’s Vollard Suite: The Sculptor’s Studio,” on view June 18 to Oct. 16. The exhibition features key images of Picasso etchings from a group of 100 prints he made for the legendary art dealer and publisher Ambroise Vollard, on loan from a private collection. The Bruce Museum is located at 1 Museum Drive in Greenwich. General admission is $7 for adults, $6 for seniors and students, free for children under five and museum members. Free admission to all on Tuesdays. Museum hours are Tuesday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Sunday 1 to 5 p.m. Closed Mondays and major holidays. For information, call the Bruce Museum at 203-869-0376, or visit www.brucemuseum.org.

The Cos Cob Library is host to a new display of children’s Chinese artwork, exhibited in the community room through Sept. 30. The exhibition is sponsored by the Chinese Language School of Connecticut, the Riverside-based, nonprofit provider of Chinese language programs to students, schools and corporations. For more information, call the Chinese Language School of Connecticut at 203-918-8085 or visit www.chineselanguageschool.org.

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01/11/10 The Raw Greenwich News Feed: Overnight Edition

The Latest Greenwich News Reports

Forget About The Greenwich Time - If you want to know what is really going on in Greenwich, Then You Have To Read The Out Of Town Newspapers .......

Taking Aim at the Big Names in Animated Film New York Times By BROOKS BARNES GREENWICH, Conn. — Slumbering in a drab-looking office building here, Blue Sky Studios, the animated-movie division of 20th Century Fox, ...

Jon Gosselin Has a New Girlfriend CDInsight Jon's new girlfriend, 25-year-old Morgan Christie is from Greenwich, Conn. A source from People confirmed that the two met while on a ski trip in Utah. ...

Morning Links: Casey Johnson buried; Tila Tequila says she 'is NOT resting in ... Buffalo News She's said to be Morgan Christie, 25, an Emory University grad who was born in tony Greenwich, Conn. but now lives in California. ...

'Faces of Light' photo exhibit on display Stamford Times Two additional Foundation of Light, Inc.-produced Faces of Light collections are also on display at the Bendheim Cancer Center in Greenwich and the Tully ...

Greenwich In The Blogoshere:

The Medical Quack: Greenwich Hospital Emergency Department Video ... By The Medical Quack Greenwich Hospital Emergency Department Video – A "Most Wired" Hospital. This is a great video from one of the best wired hospitals in the US in Greenwich, CT. The use of wrist bands matching medications is shown here. ... The Medical Quack - http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/

Jon Gosselin's New, Rich, 25-Year-Old Girlfriend : LimeLife A source says Morgan Christie fits the Greenwich mold: "She grew up very privileged, tons of money." But of course Jon claims that he's not after the money; he likes her for her. A source says the pair have been "inseparable" since ... LimeLife - http://www.limelife.com/

Medical Assistant (Greenwich, CT) - Health Care Assistant Jobs By webmaster@craigslist.org Abilis is a private, community-based nonprofit agency that supports individuals with developmental disabilities throughout Greenwich and Stamford, CT. We are currently seeking an energetic medical assistant for our Health Services ... Health Care Assistant Jobs - http://www.healthcareassistant-jobs.com/

Hardscape Artist: sculpture fountain greenwich ct By stonability Designed and built by Rising Stone, originally uploaded by Rising Stone. Handsome. Posted by stonability at 12:26 PM ... Hardscape Artist - http://hardscapeartist.blogspot.com/

Romer: Big Bank Bonuses 'Outrageous' - George's Bottom Line By George Stephanopoulos Former Fannie Mae CEO (and prominent Democrat) Daniel Mudd (2000-2008) just bought a $6M home in Greenwich CT. Is criticism of greed and ineptitude only reserved for the private sector? Posted by: bct Jan 10, 2010 12:48:26 PM ... George's Bottom Line - http://blogs.abcnews.com/george/

middletowneye: Friday Night, White Water Paddles By Lady Cyclist (Beth Emery) Or check the AMC web site under flat water kayaking, and plan on a trip to the Greenwich YMCA. The pool is a great place to practice your rolling skills (u-tube white water and sea kayak roll video) as well as self rescue skills which ... middletowneye - http://middletowneyenews.blogspot.com/

Colors and the spice of life By Publisher These two stimulating colors boost your energy level by causing your body to pump out more adrenaline, says Leslie Harrington, a founder of LH Color, a color-consulting and research firm in Old Greenwich, Connecticut. ... Amelia Island News with daily... - http://www.searchamelia.com/

Recently Updated Web Pages About Greenwich:

Glenville, Greenwich, Connecticut - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Glenville is a neighborhood or section in the town of Greenwich in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. It is located in the western part of town ...

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03/11/08 - Learn to play guitar

The Department of Parks and Recreation will offer guitar lessons at the Bendheim Western Greenwich Civic Center in Glenville.

The program will be held for six weeks beginning Monday April 7 to May 19. The program will have classes for adults and children 8 years old and older.

The class schedule will be as follows:

• Beginners 8 to 13 years old, 4 to 5 p.m.
• Returning students 8 to 13 years old, 5 to 6 p.m.
• Adults 14 and older, 6 to 7 p.m.

Students will learn chords, scales, theory and, best of all, learn to play their favorite songs. One-hour classes will focus on providing a high level of instruction in a fun, cooperative atmosphere.

Guitars will be provided each class if needed. Rentals are available.

For more information or to register, call the Bendheim WGCC at 532-1259 or visit Greenwichct.org.

Via The Greenwich Post

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Free speech carries with it some freedom to listen.
- Warren Earl Burger
[Majority opinion in 7-1 ruling that prohibited the closing of courtrooms to the press], July 2, 1980

01/14/08 - Three Cheers For The Darien Police Department

Cos Cob, Riverside and Glenville residents are going to be getting thier property back, because....

Darien police Officer Michael Cummings was not sitting on the Post Road looking for burned out car tail lights. He was patroling the streets of Darien when he saw four guys in an out of state car at 1:45 a.m. driving slowly without its headlights on a residential street.

Maybe, Chief David Ridberg needs to take half of the patrol cars sitting on the Post Road and have them patrol the streets of Byram, Cos Cob, Riverside and Glenville.

Arrest linked to car burglaries
Greenwich Time - Greenwich,CT,USA
By Michael Dinan An arrest in Darien early yesterday morning could help solve a rash of car break-ins throughout Cos Cob, Riverside and Glenville ...

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02/24/02 Forget About The Greenwich Time: Independant Journalist Kevin F. McMurray Says There Is A Possible Break In The Margolis Case?

A source in the Port Chester Police Department (PCPD) revealed that a retired detective from the department will be speaking with detectives of the Greenwich Police Department (GPD) on Monday, February 25th, regarding an arrest of a former PCPD officer on charges of pedophilia in Texas.

The former officer in custody of Texas authorities had links to the unsolved 1984 murder of 13-year old Matthew Margolies in the Glenville section of Greenwich. The retired PCPD detective who will be meeting with GPD detectives was involved in the case almost 18 years ago.

The arrested pedophile, Roger Bates, was a close family friend and neighbor of a juvenile who was questioned by GPD about his whereabouts and knowledge of the events of Labor Day weekend 1984 when the Margolies boy disappeared from near his home in the Pemberwick section of town. Matthew Margolies’s body was found less than a mile from where he was last seen on a wooded hill overlooking Pemberwick Road five days later. Although never officially acknowledged the Margolies boy’s murder has long been considered sexual driven in nature. The juvenile suspect had a police record and was known to frequent and fish in the area of the Byram River where Matthew Margolies lived. The suspect was also a known acquaintance of the victim and of other juveniles questioned in the disappearance and murder of the Margolies boy.

Bates, a PCPD officer at the time, was an obstacle in the questioning of the Port Chester suspect. Allegedly, it was Bates who convinced the suspect and his family from having him submit to a polygraph given by the GPD whose focus was the Margolies murder. It has been suspected that Bates has knowledge that could be useful in the pursuit of an arrest of a suspect in the crime.

Speculation is that the current GPD detectives in charge of the long dormant Margolies case will travel to Texas to interview the former Port Chester police officer. Conceivably, in exchange for information on the Margolies case, some leniency might be extended to Bates on his Texas charges. Bates is looking at a long sentence in the Texas penal system as a pedophile.

01/01/01 2000 Year in Review: Police make gains in unsolved cases

By J.A. Johnson Jr. - Greenwich Time

The year 2000 began with an arrest in a 25-year-old Greenwich murder mystery, and it came to and end with a local man being charged with homicide only a day after allegedly committing the crime.

In between the arrests of accused killers Michael Skakel in January and Joseph Benton in December, 2000 saw new life breathed into the investigation of another long unsolved Greenwich murder, that of 13-year-old Glenville resident Matthew Margolies in 1984.

Others who find themselves in this, the least enviable of Greenwich year-end compilations, include Blane Nordahl, who in October was sent to prison nearly five years after his arrest for breaking into the Greenwich residence of Ivana Trump and into the homes of other rich or famous victims; and William P. Benedict Jr., who in September pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the driving death of a promising young Greenwich woman.

Another notable in the Year In Crime review is former Greenwich resident Martin Frankel. He was more in the news a year earlier, when his alleged fraud scheme that authorities said was used to embezzle more than $200 million from insurance companies dominated local headlines and was news around the nation. But after fleeing the country in May 1999 and being caught as a fugitive in Hamburg, Germany, four months later, Frankel spent all of 2000 languishing in a German prison cell awaiting his expected extradition to the U.S. to face dozens of federal and state charges ranging from racketeering to money laundering.

As 1999 ended, there was an air of great expectancy concerning whether an arrest would finally be made in connection with the Halloween Eve 1975 slaying of Greenwich teenager Martha Moxley. In December 1999, a Bridgeport grand jury completed an 18-month investigation into the 15-year-old girl's death and issued a report that on Jan. 18 was used to arrest Michael Skakel. At his arraignment three months later, as he waited his turn to file out of a packed Stamford courtroom, Skakel stunned the victim's mother when he walked up to Dorthy Moxley and said, "Dorthy, I feel your pain, but you've got the wrong guy."

The events led to a summer of more courtroom drama, beginning with a hearing lasting several days to determine whether there was sufficient evidence for Skakel to stand trial. After hearing from witnesses who claimed to have heard Skakel confess to the crime, Judge Maureen Dennis ruled in a courtroom packed with journalists from around the world that Skakel's case was indeed headed to trial.

But, as 2000 comes to a close, it remains unresolved whether 40-year-old Skakel will be tried as a juvenile before a juvenile court judge or as an adult before a jury of his peers for a crime he allegedly committed when he was 15 years old. A hearing to address the issue of the proper trial venue was held in October, and Judge Dennis has until mid-February to make her ruling.

Earlier this month, on Dec. 9, firefighters responded to a house fire at 37 Prospect St. in central Greenwich. No one was believed to be home at the time, but, as investigators picked through the smoldering rubble, they found behind a shut bathroom door the body of 22-year-old William DeWitt Romig. It was determined the fire had been deliberately set by one of Romig's six housemates, 42-year-old Joseph Benton, who was charged with arson murder.

In a confession to police, Benton said he lit a couch on fire because he was angry with his landlord over the $1,200 monthly rent he was being charged. Said by his attorney to be mildly retarded, Benton is to undergo a competency hearing Tuesday in state Superior Court in Stamford. If found competent to stand trial, Benton would face a possible sentence of life without parole if convicted.

On Sept. 26, 20-year-old William P. Benedict Jr. pleaded guilty to manslaughter in what authorities had called the alcohol-related automobile accident on Cat Rock Road that killed one of the three other teens Benedict had been driving home from a party early the morning of July 24, 1999. The victim was Monique Da Lan, an 18-year-old Greenwich High School graduate and National Honor Society member who was looking forward to returning to Loyola College for her sophomore year.

Benedict had been arrested on two counts of manslaughter, one count of which was dismissed because conviction would have hinged on a legal finding of intoxication. Benedict's blood-alcohol level at the time of the accident was 0.09, just below the legal limit of 0.10. Under the remaining manslaughter count, he had faced a possible 10 years in prison, but under a plea agreement, the prosecution will ask a Superior Court judge to sentence Benedict to six years in prison, and suspend that sentence after three years. Sentencing is scheduled for Jan. 8.

The end of the Nordahl saga came perhaps fittingly in a year that saw Greenwich burglaries at a 10-year low. Greenwich historically has attracted the best among the criminal class because of its wealth, and from time to time burglars who go on costly breaking-and-entering sprees are given nicknames by police, the media, or both. The latest in this spectrum of notoriety that includes the Dinnertime Bandit, Coastal Bandits and Social Register Bandits, is Blane Nordahl, dubbed Burglar to the Stars.

While others who preceded him snuck into backcountry mansions while residents were busy having supper, or arrived at their waterfront targets in Zodiac inflatable boats, or culled victims from the Social Register, Nordahl's specialty was ripping off his wealthy victims sterling silver service items. Among the loot taken from the 40-room Vista Drive mansion of Ivana Trump, ex-wife of real estate billionaire Donald Trump, were 24 silver dinner plates worth $30,000, 12 antique French show plates worth $14,000, and 32 pairs of salt and pepper shakers valued at $120 each.

Altogether, authorities have said, Nordahl admitted to stealing silver items worth more than $500,000 in the seven Greenwich burglaries he committed between August 1995 and August 1996. He is believed to have stolen millions more in break-ins all along the East Coast - including the homes of rock star Bruce Springsteen and sportscaster Curt Gowdy - until his spree came to an end in October 1996, when arrested on a Greenwich warrant in his native Wisconsin.

Much legal wrangling and confusion over a plea bargain stalled judgment day for the 38-year-old defendant, who was finally sentenced Oct. 26 in federal court in Central Islip, N.Y. When ordering Nordahl to a prison term of five years, U.S. District Judge Jacob Mishler credited Nordahl with "time served," meaning the burglar can be freed as early as this October.

When he fled his Lake Avenue mansion in May 1999 with suitcases full of cash and diamonds - assets which authorities said were products of money laundering - Martin Frankel was several steps ahead of federal investigators who were zeroing in on Frankel's Liberty National Securities, the bogus brokerage firm Frankel allegedly used to funnel more than $200 million in embezzled assets from nearly a dozen insurance companies in seven states.

But it was other players in Frankel's alleged criminal enterprise who made headlines in 2000, most significantly Tennessee businessman John Hackney, who on Sept. 22 admitted in U.S. District Court in New Haven to having acted as Frankel's front man in diverting more than $200 million in stolen insurance funds through Liberty National Securities and into Frankel's Swiss bank accounts. Hackney, 51, had been installed by his alleged co-conspirator as head of each of the insurance companies which Frankel secretly controlled.

Hackney pleaded guilty to racketeering and money laundering for his role in Frankel's scheme, and he could be sent to prison for as long as 40 years when sentenced March 14.

Crime related stories are almost never positive, but developments that arose during 2000 concerning the unsolved 1984 murder of 13-year-old Matthew Margolies of Pilgrim Drive in Glenville could hardly be seen as anything but encouraging.

After years of dormancy, the homicide probe was revived when two Greenwich police detectives were assigned to reinvestigate the case on nearly a full-time basis. Police officials said there had been no new leads that caused them to revive the investigation, but the Margolies murder was so brutal, and many advances in forensic science had been made in the past 16 years, that they thought it was worth the time and effort to try to solve the case.

Then in September, Greenwich Time published a series of stories on the Margolies case, based on interviews, the autopsy report, and previously unreleased police reports obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request. The stories contained information about the crime itself as well as the eight "key" suspects that detectives had identified and other facts never before made public. Previously, police had only publicly said that five days after Margolies disappeared his body was found in a shallow grave about a mile from his house in Glenville's Pemberwick section, and that the boy had died as a result of multiple stab wounds and asphyxiation. As a result of the newspaper's series, the public found out just how brutal the murder had been, that not only had Margolies been stabbed more than a dozen times, but there was evidence of torture as well. According to the autopsy report, a stick and dirt were forced down the victim's throat - while he was still alive.

One theory investigators have been pursuing is that the murderer was a teenager who lived near Margolies and possibly held a grudge against the victim for having blamed Margolies for telling police about a marijuana patch he was growing along the Byram River. At the time of the fatal Aug. 31, 1984, confrontation, according to the theory, the murderer was possibly under the influence of a hallucinogenic drug.

About a month later, in mid-October, a state investigative unit that specializes in old, unsolved homicides agreed to assist the Greenwich Police Department with the Margolies case. The "cold case" unit operating out of the chief state's attorney's office in Rocky Hill assigned a squad - consisting of a veteran homicide investigator, prosecutor and forensic scientist - to coordinate efforts with the two local detectives on the case.

Greenwich Police Chief Peter Robbins and Deputy Chief State's Attorney Christopher Morano both confirmed the combined state and local effort would involve the forensic testing of physical evidence, but they would not be specific.

News of the state's involvement in the case had been greeted with great enthusiasm by the victim's mother.

"I think it's a very positive move," Maryann Margolies said in an Oct. 31 interview. "The Greenwich police are asking for a fresh pair of eyes to look over the material, to look over the evidence, and maybe they'll see something or find something by looking at it from a different perspective."

11/01/00 State unit takes up Margolies case

By J.A. Johnson Jr.

A state investigative unit that specializes in old, unsolved homicides has agreed to help the Greenwich Police Department in its reinvestigation of the 1984 Matthew Margolies murder case.

Police Chief Peter Robbins yesterday said his request for assistance from the state's "cold case squad" was accepted in early October, and a meeting was planned for later this week at which local and state detectives will discuss possible strategies.

"I think they think it can be solved, so we're happy about that," Robbins said of the unit's involvement with the Margolies case. "We'll know better where things are going after we meet this week."

News of this latest development in the long unsolved murder mystery was greeted enthusiastically by the mother of the 13-year-old Glenville boy who was fatally stabbed and suffocated in woods less than a mile from his Pilgrim Drive home on Aug. 31, 1984.

"I think it's a very positive move," Maryann Margolies said yesterday. "The Greenwich police are asking for a fresh pair of eyes to look over the material, to look over the evidence, and maybe they'll see something or find something by looking at it from a different perspective."

The cold case unit operates out of the chief state's attorney's office in Rocky Hill, under the direction of Deputy Chief State's Attorney Christopher Morano. The unit is divided into several squads, each supervised by a prosecutor and staffed by state inspectors who are seasoned homicide investigators.

When a local police department refers a case to the state unit, it also provides at least one, but usually two, of its detectives.

"The goal is to combine all those resources to give cold cases a thorough examination from all different angles," Morano said. "It's a team effort."

Sgt. Timothy Duff and Detective Gary Hoffkins, the two Greenwich officers who began a reinvestigation of the Margolies murder earlier this year, will be working closely with the state unit, Robbins said.

Morano, a native of Greenwich who is now the second-highest ranking prosecutor in the state, cautioned against any undue expectations that the Margolies case will be solved as a result of his unit's involvement.

"I want to stress that this is going to be a long and tedious process, and a majority of cold cases are not solved," he said.

Morano said that only seven of the more than 20 cold cases his unit has examined since its formation in 1998 have resulted in arrests.

Nevertheless, he said the cold case unit agrees to take on an investigation only when there appears to be a chance to solve it.

"It has to be something where we believe there are areas where that can be examined, say, forensically or suspect-wise," Morano said. "There has to be a real reason to rehash the case. If something's already been rehashed to death, and there's no fodder for further investigation, then probably we won't get involved."

Neither state or local officials would cite specific reasons why the Margolies case was a good candidate for acceptance by the state unit.

However, it was previously reported by Greenwich Time that new leads and potential witnesses had surfaced after the newspaper published a series of stories about the Margolies case in September. The stories, based on interviews, the autopsy report and police records obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request, contained information about the murder, suspects and other facts never before made public.

It was also learned from police that some of the new leads detectives were pursuing involved information that one of eight "key" suspects - a teenager who lived near Margolies and possibly held a grudge against the victim - may have ingested multiple doses of a hallucinogenic drug the day of the murder. Originally thought to have been sexually motivated, police are now examining whether the murder may have been committed by someone under the influence of drugs.

Robbins and Morano also indicated that the combined state and local effort will involve testing of physical evidence by forensic scientists, but they would not provide details.

09/19/00 Press reports on Margolies case prompt new leads

By J.A. Johnson Jr. - Greenwich Time

The publication of newly released details about the murder of Glenville teenager Matthew Margolies nearly two decades ago has resulted in new and potentially valuable information, police said yesterday.

Those details, contained in a series of stories by Greenwich Time earlier this month, prompted some readers to come forward with previously unreported information about the activities of one or more suspects on Aug. 31, 1984, the day Margolies, 13, was believed to have been tortured and killed in a wooded area near the Byram River, according to police.

Police said a better understanding of a suspect's actions before and after the murder could help detectives more closely link a suspect to the crime. Few details about the new information were released.

The stories, based on 610 pages of police reports the newspaper obtained after filing a Freedom of Information Act complaint, gave the public the first detailed glimpse of the brutal nature of the murder and subsequent investigation, the most extensive Greenwich police said they had ever undertaken.

"It's generated a lot of activity for our investigators," Police Chief Peter Robbins said of the news articles. "We've gotten some new information from people we've heard from before, and other information has come from people we've never heard from."

Robbins would not be specific about the new information, except to say some of it concerned "the whereabouts at certain times" on the day of the murder of one or more of the eight suspects in the case.

The Margolies murder investigation was reactivated in March, when two detectives were assigned to the case on a full-time basis. According to Robbins, the detectives are now in the process of following up on the new information.

Greenwich Time had requested a copy of the Margolies murder case file from the Police Department in October, and when the request was denied a complaint was lodged with the Connecticut Freedom of Information Commission. The complaint was withdrawn in June, under an FOIC-brokered settlement, in which police agreed to release reports from the Margolies case file with suspects' names and other information deemed crucial for the investigation blacked out.

Although heavily edited, it is clear from the released police reports the investigation has focused on the following suspects:

A 32-year-old maintenance worker and suspected pedophile who a year before Margolies was murdered allegedly assaulted a 16-year-old male jogger in the woods along the Byram River.

A 16-year-old boy known as a neighborhood bully who knew the victim and had roughed up Margolies weeks before the murder. He was arrested a month before Margolies was murdered for allegedly assaulting another 13-year-old boy, and had pulled a knife on another neighborhood boy in an incident that went unreported.

A 16-year-old occasional fishing companion of Margolies who once told someone that he would like to "ditch that little bastard," and whose activities the day of the murder have been questioned by detectives.

A 17-year-old boy from Margolies' neighborhood who was thought to have had a revenge motive because he blamed the victim for telling police about marijuana plants he had grown and was subsequently arrested.

A 38-year-old man who worked in Glenville who might have been familiar with the victim and whose activities shortly after the murder were viewed as suspicious.

A suspected pedophile in his late 20s who drove a red pick-up truck similar to one witnesses said they saw near the crime scene just prior to Margolies' murder.

A 47-year-old man who had aroused the suspicion of state police while being questioned about a series of shootings along Interstate 95.

A man in his 50s who lived in Margolies' neighborhood and had a history of criminal violence.

09/08/00 Analysis of a homicide investigation; where does the Matthew Margolies murder case go from here?

Police look for break in unsolved case
By Cameron Martin - Greenwich Time

Though the 1984 murder of Matthew Margolies remains unsolved, investigators need look no further than the case of Martha Moxley to know breaks can come years, even decades, after a crime is committed.

Retired Greenwich police Chief William Andersen, who initially headed the Margolies murder investigation as captain of detectives, says the recent developments in the Moxley murder case should hearten investigators frustrated by the Margolies slaying.

Andersen, who retired more than a decade ago, retains hope Matthew's murder will be solved and says his thoughts return regularly to the horrific crime committed Labor Day Weekend 1984.

Still, after 16 years, and countless leads and investigative interviews, Andersen and other officers familiar with the case say they share that common emotion: frustration.

"I certainly hope whoever is responsible, that it's weighing on their minds as much as the investigators,' " Andersen said.

Most Greenwich Police officers who were on the force in 1984, or have investigated the murder since, never knew Matthew Margolies. Lt. Ralph LoBalbo is an exception.

A patrolman assigned to the Glenville section of town from 1981 to 1986, LoBalbo was a familiar face to residents of Pemberwick, areas of which Matthew often fished with his grandfather, George Miazga.

Miazga, a longtime volunteer with the Glenville Fire Department, frequented the firehouse, often with his grandson in tow. LoBalbo said he knew them both, if only to say "hey."

"I knew who Matthew was, I knew he liked to go fishing," LoBalbo said. "When it was reported he was missing, I was concerned; he didn't seem the type of kid who would just run away."

Though officers say they considered the possibility that Matthew was distraught over the death of his grandfather, who died two weeks before Matthew's Aug. 31 disappearance, or, that he may have accidentally fallen into the water by one of his numerous fishing holes, they nevertheless say the search for a missing person was soon displaced by a notion of something more sinister.

"There was a collective thought throughout the community that something happened to the kid," LoBalbo said.

The night his mother reported him missing, even then Youth Officer Stephen Paulo suspected something far worse.

"When she called a little concerned, saying it was getting dark, I went right over," Paulo remembers. "It was a gut feeling with me."

Paulo said he immediately called the on-duty lieutenant and said, "Something's wrong with this."

From Aug. 31 until the afternoon of Sept. 5, Paulo, as youth officer, led the search for 13-year-old Matthew Margolies.

Scheduled to take a sergeant's exam the evening of Sept. 5, Paulo soon found his mind focused far from the prospect of promotion.

Notified in the afternoon that a body had been found in a wooded area on a hill overlooking Pemberwick Road, Paulo recalled, "I said, 'Well, let's go out and look.' "

Three weeks ago Paulo retraced the route he and other officers took Sept. 5, 1984.

"This was all undeveloped, all woods," he said, pointing to the apartment complex at 351 Pemberwick Road, just north of the crime scene.

Down the road a bit, hiking uphill through underbrush that has grown in since 1984, Paulo tried to recall the exact spot where Matthew's body was found.

What came to mind, instead, was the brutality of the crime scene.

Paulo had been searching the area with Fred Lambert and fellow Youth Officer Michael Panza. Lambert was the man who discovered the shoe and later the body of Matthew Margolies.

"After we saw the shoe, we said, 'Do you smell that?' I mean, you could smell (the decomposing body)," Paulo grimly recalls. "We knew we were close by."

And they were.

"Lambert says, 'Oh god,' " Paulo said. "Then we froze everything off."

There would be no sergeant's exam for Paulo on Sept. 5, 1984, as Greenwich Police undertook the investigation of the brutal mutilation murder of a 13-year-old boy.

"I was too wound up, (the investigation) meant a lot to me. I said, 'I'll take it next time.' "

Instead he was among the officers present when Maryann Margolies was told the fate of her only son and youngest child.

"I stayed there at the house for two days with her afterwards," he said.

Emotionally, officers have stayed with the case much longer. Though the two original detectives assigned to investigate the murder would not comment for this article, one of them, retired Detective Richard Haug, said in a May 1998 interview with Greenwich Time: "This case really affected me mentally - that a 13-year-old boy was brutally slain - and I really regretted it when I retired that we weren't able to solve it."

Andersen said he thinks about the Matthew Margolies case regularly,

"He's been in my prayers every Sunday since 1984," he said. "I'll never forget him, though I never met him."

Andersen now manages security for a local corporation. He was promoted to deputy chief soon after the murder and later rose to police chief - a path paralleled by present Police Chief Peter Robbins, who took over as captain of the detectives division after Andersen's promotion in Oct. 1984.

Round-the-clock commitment to the case equaled months of sleepless nights, the two recall.

The atmosphere was hectic at the police department in the months following the murder, Robbins said.

"We worked straight for four months, right through the holidays," he recalls. "We suffered a lot of frustration. We had 40 to 50 leads that looked like they had some potential. As you explored them, in time, they dissipated.

"We suffered a great deal of frustration, but you'd keep at it. We weren't sleeping much. It was 16- to 20-hour days right through the holidays that year. After we had just enough sleep we'd just get right back into it again."

The FBI drafted a psychological profile of the murderer of Matthew Margolies, concluding the assailant was someone familiar with the victim and the Pemberwick area. Robbins said the police department has conducted hundreds of interviews with that area's residents since 1984.

Is it likely the murderer was interviewed by police?

"It's possible," Robbins said. "I couldn't say with 100 percent certainty. We conducted hundreds and hundreds of interviews during the course of the investigation."

Confidence in finding the perpetrator has ebbed and flowed within the police department in the last 16 years, Robbins said. Right now he is balancing optimism with pessimism.

"I probably have a mixed feeling of confidence now. Unless some witness can come forth to point us in a particular direction, it's difficult to focus on a particular suspect, or suspects, but that doesn't mean we give up.

"We did everything that could possibly be done at that time, but it just didn't pull anything out of the woodwork, so to speak."

A Stamford judge recently decided Michael Skakel should stand trial for the 1975 slaying of Martha Moxley, both of whom were 15 years old at the time.

The judge's decision hinged upon the testimony of residents of an alcohol rehabilitation clinic Skakel attended in the years following the murder. Witnesses for the prosecution allege Skakel admitted to the murder, and a Juvenile Matters judge concluded there was enough evidence to proceed to trial, though it has yet to be determined whether the matter will be heard in juvenile or adult court.

Andersen said developments in the Moxley murder case, nearly a quarter century after the crime, provide hope that someone, "or someones," will ultimately be charged with the murder of Matthew Margolies.

"I have faith that someday it will be solved. The case is not going to go away. With the right breaks it will be solved.

"In situations like this you have to have faith, and I certainly do. I think we only need look into the recent past to see that that happens. Old cases are broken all the time."

03/23/00 Margolies Case File is Subject of Hearing

By Ryan Jockers - Greenwich Time

The state Freedom of Information Commission next week is to hear arguments on whether Greenwich police can withhold records on the 1984 murder of 13-year-old Matthew Margolies of Glenville.

Greenwich Time, alleging a violation of the Freedom of Information Act, on Oct. 7 appealed Greenwich Police Chief Peter Robbins' denial of its request for the department's records of the case, which remains unsolved. The Freedom of Information Commission scheduled a hearing for the appeal for 2:30 p.m. Wednesday in Hartford.

"The Margolies murder was a much-publicized case that is 15 years old, and we believe Greenwich residents should have information regarding the police investigation," said Joseph F. Pisani, editor and senior vice president of Greenwich Time.

Margolies' body was found partly covered with leaves on a secluded hillside outside the Glenville neighborhood near the Byram River on Sept. 5, 1984. The Greenwich Police Department began to reinvestigate the Margolies murder in June 1998, the same month in which a grand jury convened to hear witnesses in the 1975 murder of 15-year-old Martha Moxley.

Eighteen months later, the grand jury found probable cause to arrest Michael Skakel, now 39, a former neighbor of Moxley's and a nephew of Ethel Kennedy, who was arrested Jan. 19 on a charge of murder. Skakel was arraigned March 14 and has claimed his innocence through his attorney, Michael Sherman of Stamford. On Aug. 31, J.A. Johnson Jr., a Greenwich Time reporter, made a formal written request to Robbins for the Police Department's records concerning the Margolies murder investigation. A month later, on Oct. 1, Robbins denied the request, citing a state law that exempts certain public records from being made public because disclosure would not be in the public interest. Robbins did not say in what way he felt the release of records would hurt the public interest. An example of such records, according to the state law, includes those that would endanger individuals who were previously unidentified, signed statements of witnesses, investigation techniques not known to the public and arrest records of juveniles.

Robbins would not comment yesterday on the forthcoming Freedom of Information Commission hearing.

According to police, Matthew Margolies set out the afternoon of Aug. 31, 1984, from his Pilgrim Drive home to pursue his pastime, fishing in the Byram River. Police said they believe Margolies was killed the same afternoon by someone who repeatedly stabbed and strangled him. The boy's partially nude body was discovered five days later in a wooded area near the river. The boning knife believed to be the murder weapon was found a short distance from the body. There was no evidence Margolies had been sexually assaulted.

Shortly after the murder, the FBI's Behavioral Science Unit profiled Margolies' killer as a white male familiar with Glenville, who knew Margolies as well as the victim's passion for fishing. In a town-funded 1986 paid consultant's critique of the Police Department's investigation, the murderer was further characterized as a sadist who lured the victim to a secluded area where he would be able to act out his gory fantasies.

02/10/00 EDITORIAL: ANOTHER OLD MURDER WAITS TO BE SOLVED

Greenwich Time

THE ISSUE: Developments in the Moxley case serve to underline the lack of an arrest in the killing of another teen.

The well-publicized arrest of a suspect in the 1975 murder of 15-year-old Martha Moxley is a painful reminder to some townspeople that another slaying involving a Greenwich teen remains unsolved. For townspeople who rememberthe 1984 case involving 13-year-old Matthew Margolies, the lack of resolution is especially troubling in a community that has a reputation as a safe place to raise children.

A police investigation into the Margolies killing was reopened in 1998, but the mystery continues. For more than 15 years, questions have gone unanswered about what happened to the boy after he left his Glenville home to go fishing on August 31, 1984. His partially clad, stabbed and strangled body was discovered in a shallow grave near the Byram River five days later. Nearby was a boning knife that police believe was the murder weapon.

The single biggest similarity for the two cases is obvious: Both murders involved teens who were brutally murdered in places that residents considered to be safe.

But the differences are substatial, and some observers may find them telling. Martha Moxley's body was found on the grounds of her well-to-do family's Belle Haven mansion; Matthew Margolies remains were unearthed in a wooded area some distance from the working-class home where his mother still livesin Glenville. Dorthy Moxley, Martha's mother, spent years as an activist seeking justice, talking with receptive media representatives to press law enforcement officials to identify and charge her daughter's killer; Maryann Margolies, while cooperative and interested in the same kind of resolution, has not been able to elicit the same kind of interest.

The biggest fifference may involve the slaying suspects, which in turn may explain the amount of attention these bereaved mothers and the murder cases have received. Suspects in the Moxley case were members of the Skakel family, neighbors of the slain girl, who are related to the Kennedy family by marrage. The man who has been charged in her murder is Michael Skakel, 39, the nephew of the widow of Robert Kennedy. Police have not identified a suspect in the Margolies case.

After Mr. Skakel's arrest last month, Mrs. Margolies told staff writer Ryan Jockers, "I don't think it's done intentionally ...but the stark riality is that fame and fortune are factors to be considered." For her part, Mrs. Moxley told Mr. Jockers that Matthew Margolies should "get her story out".

The arrest in the Moxley slaying indicates that resolution of old murder cases needn't be considered forever stymied. Importantly, there are other factors involved in the Margolies case. Greenwich Police Chief Peter Robbins was the lieutenant who supervised the department's initial investigation, and he has said he wants to do all that is possible to identify the boy's killer and bring that individual to trial. Many townspeople who lived in Greenwich in 1984 recall the slaying and continue to be quietly outraged that it could occur within their community.

Beyond that, Mrs. Margolies has remained optimistic that an arrest ultimately will be made in the death of her son. That quiet confidence in the face of an unimaginable tragety is complling. We can only hope that in time authorities will solve the mystery of the awful killing of Matthew Margolies and bring his murderer to justice.

01/25/00 A mother seeks justice in town's ‘other murder’

By Ryan Jockers - Greenwich Time

With the recent arrest in a long-unsolved murder of a Greenwich teenager, a similar case remains unsolved. This case, however, is far removed from an exclusive waterfront community, Kennedy relatives and a popular young girl from California.

And while the case of Matthew Margolies, who was 13 in 1984 when he was found in a shallow grave on a secluded hillside outside his Glenville neighborhood, does not have the made-for-television elements of the 1975 murder of 15-year-old Martha Moxley, his case is equally as compelling. Thus far, no one has been arrested for killing the boy.

Michael Skakel, now 39, a former neighbor of Moxley, was arrested last week after the state, in a last-ditch attempt to solve the crime, invoked a seldom-used grand jury statute that found probable cause to arrest him after an 18-month investigation. Skakel surrendered to the murder charge but maintains his innocence through his attorney, Michael Sherman of Stamford.

Maryann Margolies, Matthew's mother, who lives in the same home in which she last saw her son, said yesterday that the idea of a grand jury investigating her son's murder was appealing, though she has not taken steps to initiate such action.

Until State's Attorney Jonathan Benedict applied for and received approval from a three-judge panel in New Haven to appoint a one-man grand jury in 1998 to investigate Moxley's death, Margolies said she was unaware the option existed.

"It's appealing because obviously it led to an arrest in the Moxley case, and very well could lead to an arrest in my son's case," Margolies said in the living room of her home, decorated with photographs of Matthew. "But I'm not rushing into anything. I guess I'm rather cautious. I like to have details. I like to think things through."

The Greenwich Police Department began to reinvestigate the murder of Matthew Margolies in June 1998, the same month the Moxley grand jury convened.

In an interview with Greenwich Time in September, Greenwich Police Chief Peter Robbins said the reinvestigation of the 1984 murder was moving slowly but he expected it to build momentum after the department settled down after a major reorganization of personnel. Calling the work environment at the time stable, Robbins said of the Margolies case, "We're really going to have to pick things up and get going."

Robbins could not be reached yesterday for comment for this article.

Robbins, who supervised the Margolies investigation as a lieutenant, has shown optimism toward solving the case in various interviews with Greenwich Time. Yesterday, Maryann Margolies said she, too, is optimistic that an arrest will ultimately be made in her son's murder.

"I think there is light at the end of the tunnel," she said.

According to police, Matthew Margolies set out on the afternoon of Aug. 31, 1984, from his Pilgrim Drive home to go fishing in the Byram River, which had become a pastime for the boy. Police said they believe the boy was killed the same afternoon by someone who repeatedly stabbed and strangled him. The boy's partially nude body was discovered five days later in a wooded area near the river. A boning knife believed to be the murder weapon was found a short distance from the body.

Shortly after the murder, the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Behavioral Science Unit profiled Margolies' killer as a white male familiar with Glenville, who knew Margolies as well as the victim's passion for fishing.

In 1986 the town paid an independent consultant to review the Police Department's investigation. That analysis further characterized the murderer as a sadist who lured the victim to a secluded area where he would be able to act out his gory fantasies.

Before reinvestigating the Margolies case, police tracked down occasional leads but the murder of a working-class family's only son did not attract as much attention as the Moxley case. Moxley was bludgeoned to death outside her family's mansion in the affluent Belle Haven section of town with a golf club belonging to a set owned by the prominent Skakel family.

The Moxley case maintained a high profile as Michael Skakel and his older brother Thomas, the prime suspect in the case for many years, are nephews of Ethel Kennedy, widow of Robert F. Kennedy. Michael and Thomas Skakel, then 15 and 17, respectively, were with Moxley the night she was killed. Thomas Skakel has also denied any wrongdoing.

The Moxley case was the subject of two nonfiction books, the inspiration for a novel and subsequent television miniseries, and provided fodder for numerous talk shows and other television programs. In books and at a Web site devoted to the Moxley murder, the Margolies case has been referred to as "Greenwich's other unsolved murder."

"I don't think it's done intentionally," Margolies said. "I'd like to live in a naive bubble but the stark reality is that fame and fortune are factors to be considered."

Margolies, who works in a nursing capacity for the city of Stamford, said more media attention in her son's murder case "would only be helpful." Dorthy Moxley, mother of Martha Moxley, said her advice to the Margolies would be to "get her story out" to people.

Investigators and journalists who have covered the Moxley case have said that if not for Dorthy Moxley's persistence in keeping the story of her murdered daughter's death in the news, it would have faded into obscurity.

"I don't see how someone could commit a horrible crime and not tell somebody, and that somebody might be willing to tell," Moxley said yesterday from her home in Chatham Township, N.J. "Talk to the media; do television if you can. I know it's hard, but do it, and maybe someday you'll reap some success."

12/10/99 Mrs. Margolies hasn't given up; Mother of slain Glenville boy says 'when' NOT 'if'

By Peter Moore
Greenwich Post

When Maryann Margolies speaks of an eventual arrest for the 1984 murder of her son Matthew, she speaks in terms of "when" and not "if"

Strangely enough, she also says that she's never experienced any anger towards Matthew's unknown killer. "Not yet," she adds.

In reference to the crime, she continues, "No one had the right to do it. What I would like to know is when the person is found and arrested can I forgive? I honestly don't know. I can't tell what my feelings will be at this time."

For more than 15 years, Maryann Margolies has led her family in a quest to keep living and to not languish in grief or bitterness.

"I have to think about moving forward," she says, while keeping her composure in the living room of her Pilgrim Drive house where she resides with her husband Jim. "I have to think about living life. However I respond would have an effect [on the family]." She adds that if she wallowed in misery, "it would be more difficult for anybody to have any semblance of happiness."

The whole process dates back to the day of Aug. 31, 1984 when 13-year-old Matthew Margolies left his grandmother's house in Glenville to go fishing. Accounts vary as to where Margolies was last seen alive, but he never came home. Five days later, his body was found in a wooded area near Hawthorne and Greenway Street. He had been stabbed several times and asphyxiated, before his unknown assailant had disposed of his body in a shallow grave.

Maryann recalls Matthew as an active boy who didn't like to confine himself to the house. Shd describes her son as a big baseball fan whose favorite player was Reggie Jackson. Matthew was also fascinated with the outdoors, she adds. "He had a fishing pole in his hand as a rattle," she recalls with a smile.

A silver-franied photograph in Maryann and Jim's living room shows a young Matthew canoeing while another photo shows him peering intently at a single blade of grass. "I would say that [photo] epitomizes his interest in nature and living things," Maryann adds. "He always had that curiosity."

Police have never named a suspect in the killing. In an outside investigation by consultant Vernon Geberth, a former New York City Police Department lieutenant commander, the murder was detemiined to be a crime of lust - Matthew's athletic shorts were stripped off, yet there were no signs that he had been molested.

Geberth also faulted the Greenwich Police Department's investigation, particularly in the early stages before Matthew's body was discovered. The department had not handled a homicide since 15-year-old Martha Moxley was found bludgeoned near her Belle Haven home in 1975. Geberth revealed that no detective had been assigned to Matthew's original missing person report. By the time the body was found, Geberth said, "the investigative arm of the Greenwich Police Department had, in effect, lost six days of crucial informational interviews and neighborhood canvasses, which would later prove to be significant to the homicide investigation." But Maryann Margolies said that she does not completely fault the police department. "I think they "the investigative arm of the Greenwich Police Department had, in effect, lost six days of crucial informational interviews and neighborhood canvasses, which would later prove to be significant to the homicide investigation."

But Maryann Margolies said that she does not completely fault the police department. "I think they tried," she said. "I think they made a concerted effort. They were very compassionate. They were supportive, I was supportive."

However she acknowledges, "They did make some mistakes. They're were some things they should have done differently." But she then adds, "They haven't had to have much involvement in having to find murderers."

The names of the three central suspects in the Margolies case tried," she said. "I think they made a concerted effort. They were very compassionate. They were supportive, I was supportive."

However she acknowledges, "They did make some mistakes. They're were some things they should have done differently." But she then adds, "They haven't had to have much involvement in having to find murderers." The names of the three central suspects in the Margolies case have not been released. Margolies said she has stronger suspicions of two, whom she also declined to identify. It has been revealed that one of the suspects was an acknowledged neighborhood bully who.has since even been accused by a former area father of earlier threatening his own son with a knife similar to the one used to kill Matthew Margolies.

Another suspect was a teenage troublemaker from over the state have not been released. Margolies said she has, stronger suspicions of two, whom she also declined to identify. It has been revealed that one of the suspects was an acknowledged neighborhood bully who has since even been accused by a former area father of earlier threatening his own son with a knife similar to the one used to kill Matthew Margolies.

Another suspect was a teenage troublemaker from over the state line in Port Chester, N.Y. who, like Matthew, frequently fished from the Byram River. This suspect and his father, a Port Chester police officer, agreed to meet a Greenwich detective for a polygraph examination after Matthew's body was found. But on the appointed day, neither showed up. The suspect was recently reported by a retired Port Chester police detective to be serving time in prison for another crime.

In May 1998, Police Chief Peter Robbins announced that the Greenwich Police Department was launching an all-out investigation to solve the Matthew Margolies case. An August 1998 published report quoted Robbins as saying, "I believe the killer is still living here in " town and I think we have the potential to locate this individual and build a good case against him."

Earlier this year, the department asked the state to evaluate forensic evidence connected to the case for DNA samples. In April, Elaine Pagliaro, acting director of the Connecticut Forensic Science Laboratory, said the state would answer the department's request by the end of the month. Information on the laboratory's answer is not available. Pagliaro was saiid Tuesday to be out of her office due to illness.

Chief Robbins refused to comment Tuesday on any aspect of the investigation, including the status of DNA testing. "It's an open case," he said. But Maryann Margolies says that she is convinced that her son's murder will be solved.

"I feel very strongly that whoever did this will be arrested at some point. I'm not giving up on that.

I find it very difficult to believe that given the time of day that this happened, that there [isn't] someone out there who has a piece of information we don't know," she continued. "They may not know how important the information is. They may have their own reasons for not saying anything."

Matthew's mother also remains determined to honor her son's memory.

"There are two things I can do for Matthew. One is to see that justice is carried out. Two, to see that anything connected with his death will be handled with dignity.

"And of course love goes without saying. He's my son and I'll always love him."

07/05/98 New probe of 14-year-old Margolies murder begins

By J.A. Johnson Jr. - Greenwich Time

The renewed investigation into the unsolved 1984 murder of 13-year-old Glenville resident Matthew Margolies is under way.

After a recent review of the extensive but dormant Margolies case file, a Greenwich detective began conducting interviews two weeks ago to officially launch the renewed murder probe.

"We've started some interviews, Detective Division Captain James Walters said Thursday. He would not disclose whether those questioned included suspects. According to police, more than 60 people were initially identified as possible suspects, a number that was whittled down to about a dozen, some of whom remain under suspicion.

The reinvestigation of the Margolies case was announced in May, when Police Chief Peter Robbins revealed his department was planning to launch an all-out effort to find out who nearly 14 years ago sadistically murdered Margolies and buried him in a shallow grave beside the Byram River.

Though police followed up on occasional leads in the case, the murder of the only son of a working-class family has not been as actively investigated as has the case of Martha Moxley, a 15-year-old who was bludgeoned to death outside her family's mansion in the affluent Belle Haven section of town in 1975.

The Moxley case has maintained a high profile because two nephews of the late U.S. Sen. Robert Kennedy are among the murder suspects. The case has been the subject of two recently published books, the inspiration for a novel and subsequent television miniseries, as well as fodder for numerous talk shows and other television programs. A reinvestigation of the Moxley case was launched in 1991, and last month a grand jury was appointed to probe the matter.

Robbins was promoted captain and placed in charge of the Detective Division three months after Margolies was killed. For reasons he would not explain, Robbins said he had been unable to pursue the case as vigorously as he had wanted. But in a May interview, Robbins said that as a result of his appointment as chief eight months earlier, he found himself in a position to do things with the investigation he previously could not.

On Thursday, the police chief said he remained optimistic the case would be solved.

I just think that it's a solvable case, but I don't want to go into why I believe that at this time," Robbins said.

The victim's mother, Maryann Margolies, who still lives in Glenville, has declined comment on the reopening of her son's case.

According to Walters, there have been no new developments that warranted the renewed investigation, but he said it was hoped that advances in forensic science since the 1984 slaying would play a pivotal role in identifying the youth's killer.

"We're going to re-evaluate all the evidence to see if they should be submitted for further forensic analysis," he said. "There is a substantial body of evidence in this case."

In addition to a knife found near Margolies' body, believed to be the murder weapon, Walters said the initial investigation recovered trace evidence. Although he would not disclose what was recovered, trace evidence can include hair, clothing fibers, semen, or any other physical evidence a killer leaves at the crime scene.

No fingerprints were found on the alleged murder weapon, as the knife was exposed to rain during the five days Margolies' body went undiscovered.

According to police, Margolies set out the afternoon of August 31, 1984 from his Pilgrim Drive home to go fishing in the Byram River. Police said they believed the boy was killed the same afternoon by someone who repeatedly stabbed and strangled him. The boy's partially nude body was discovered five days later in a wooded area near the river. The boning knife believed to be the murder weapon was found a short distance. from the body.

Shortly after the murder, the FBIis Behavioral Science unit profiled Margolies' killer as a white male familiar with Glenville, who knew Margolies as well as the victim's passion for fishing. In a town funded 1986 paid consultant's critique of the Police Department's investigation, the murderer was further characterized as a sadist who lured his victim to a secluded area where he would be able to act out his gory fantasies.

Walters said no time limit has been set on the renewed investigation, "The investigation isn't going to be limited by time constraints," he said. "We will spend whatever time is necessary to follow all leads and review all the evidence to further the investigation as far as we can."