Ken Littleton

American homicide suspect, investigated after the murder of 15-year-old Martha Moxley on 10/30/1985. The teenager had been savagely killed with the iron end of a golf club, struck in the head with such frenzy that the club had shattered. She had then been stabbed repeatedly with the jagged shaft of the club. The girl had been last seen alive outside the home of Thomas Skakel, then 17, a nephew of Ethel Kennedy. The investigation originally focused on Skakel and on Littleton, a live-in tutor for the Skakel family of seven kids. Rushton Skakel had been widowed two years prior and kept help in the house for the kids. Ken Littleton Jr., 23, was on his first day of the job as tutor and had gone out to a dinner outing with the Skakel children. A number of kids were out for Halloween, with no thought of danger. Sometime after 9:30 PM, police said, Moxley crossed the Skakel's side yard and headed up the driveway of her own home, diagonally across the street. It was there that she met her killer. When she did not come home, her mother began to call her friends and about 3:45 AM, the police. Shortly before noon of the 31st, a girlfriend found Martha's body under a pine tree on the estate. Littleton, a graduate of Williams College, had been raised in Belmont, MA and was teaching science at Greenwich's private Brunswick School where the Skakel boys were students. According to Mrs. Moxley, he and Martha did not know each other. Littleton had been convicted of theft in 1977 from several shops in Nantucket. In 1982 he was found guilty of petty larceny in Orlando and Fort Lauderdale, FL. He was dropped from scrutiny as there was no evidence or motive to tie him to the case. Years later, on 1/19/2000, Michael Skakel, 39, was charged with the murder of Martha Moxley in spite of thin physical evidence and convicted in early 2002. For 15 years, Littleton had been a prime suspect, for which he was extremely bitter. He has been unable to hold jobs, his mental condition has deteriorated and he has been involved in drug and alcohol abuse. On 7/21/1999, police were called to his Beacon Hill apartment where they found him bleeding profusely from multiple stab wounds in the chest and arm. His live-in girlfriend told investigators that he had been acting paranoid prior to the incident, saying that people were trying to kill him, and the wounds were determined to be self-inflicted. Littleton stated that he has bipolar disorder and substance addictions and the day before the stabbing, had been discharged from a Boston area mental hospital where he had admitted himself a week earlier.