Chappaquiddick

On the nighttime of xviii July 1969, Mary Jo Kopechne died when the auto inwards which she was riding plunged off a depression span on the Massachusetts isle of Chappaquiddick together with landed on its roof inwards the H2O below. Senator Edward M. Kennedy reported to local police trace the next forenoon that he had been driving the auto at the fourth dimension of the accident.

Charged with leaving the scene of an accident, he pleaded guilty together with was given a suspended sentence. H5N1 coroner’s inquest into Kopechne’s expiry held inwards Jan 1970 together with a subsequent grand jury investigation held inwards March of that twelvemonth produced no novel legal developments.

The final official outcome of the instance was the revocation of Kennedy’s driver’s license inwards May 1970 after a routine fatal-accident investigation yesteryear the Registry of Motor Vehicles. The hearing examiner, similar the gauge who had sentenced Kennedy, concluded that he had been driving besides fast.


Kennedy made no populace controversy until the calendar week next the accident, when he spoke inwards a alive boob tube broadcast from his home. He stated inwards that broadcast, together with has maintained always since, that he was driving (but non intoxicated) on the nighttime of the accident together with that after the auto went into the H2O he made vigorous (but unsuccessful) efforts to rescue Kopechne.

All conspiracy theories close the accident turn down this version of events. The theories autumn into 3 groups that allege, respectively, a conspiracy to identify blame on Kennedy, a conspiracy to divert blame from Kennedy, together with a conspiracy to embrace upwardly an before criminal offense yesteryear staging the “accident.”

The Setting together with the Accident

The isle of Martha’s Vineyard lies vii miles off the southeastern coast of Massachusetts. It is divided into half-dozen towns, of which Edgartown (at the far eastern cease of the island) is the oldest, largest, together with most visibly prosperous. Chappaquiddick, where the accident took place, is a political together with cultural appendage of Edgartown.

Functionally an isle itself, it is separated from Edgartown proper yesteryear a 500-foot-wide channel crossed yesteryear a small, bargelike auto ferry. The eastern border of Chappaquiddick is a long, at i time sea beach backed yesteryear a narrow torso of H2O known as Poucha Pond.

Dyke Bridge, the site of the accident, arches over the pond, connecting Chappaquiddick’s small-scale route scheme to the parking lot behind the beach. The span (since demolished together with rebuilt) angled 27 degrees to the left of the route leading to it. It had, inwards 1969, solely 4-inch strips of timber to grade the edges of its deck.

Kennedy together with Kopechne—a old fellow member of Senator Robert F. Kennedy’s staff—arrived separately at a political party held at a rented cottage on Chappaquiddick on the nighttime of xviii July. Leaving the cottage together soon before 12:45 A.M., they drove northward inwards a dark 1967 Oldsmobile 88 toward Chappaquiddick’s principal intersection. H5N1 left plow at the intersection, next Chappaquiddick’s sole paved road, would take away hold taken them to the ferry landing— their intended destination, according to Kennedy.

Instead, upon reaching the intersection, they turned correct onto the gravel route leading to Dyke Bridge together with the beach beyond. Deputy Sheriff Christopher Look, a Chappaquiddick resident on his agency home, reached the intersection at the same fourth dimension together with witnessed the turn. Moments later, the auto carrying Kennedy together with Kopechne reached the span together with failed to negotiate it.


Traveling at 20–25 miles per hour, it jumped the depression guard rails together with ran off the correct side of the bridge, hitting the H2O on its correct side together with rolling inverted as it sank into 8–10 feet of water. Kennedy, apparently washed out of the auto yesteryear the in-rushing water, escaped. Kopechne, trapped as the auto rolled over, drowned.

Conspiracy to Blame Kennedy

Heir to the greatest political dynasty inwards twentieth-century U.S. history, Edward Kennedy was considered a rigid competitor for the Democratic presidential nomination inwards 1972. The accident effectively ended his chances of winning the nomination, together with he announced inwards 1970 that he would non run. Conspiracy theorists of the political Left speculated, as a result, that the “accident” had been staged yesteryear agents of the Right to hand exactly that goal.

Kennedy, according to this theory, was kidnapped, drugged, placed inwards the auto with Kopechne, together with pushed off the bridge—leaving him (if he survived) to explicate why he was headed for a deserted beach at midnight with a adult woman who was non his wife.

Allegations of rightwing involvement inwards the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy inwards 1963 together with leading presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy inwards 1968 lent a mensurate of plausibility to such theories. So, after 1973, did revelations that the Nixon management had employed “dirty tricks,” some of them illegal, against its political enemies.

Few believers inwards a right-wing framing of Kennedy take away hold developed the theory inwards depth. The principal exception is R. B. Cutler, 1973 whose self-published majority You, The Jury outlines a complex scenario involving 3 separate groups of agents together with a Kennedy look-alike used as a temporary decoy.

Cutler’s majority blames the framing on unspecified individuals or organizations determined to bar Kennedy from the presidency. Richard Nixon, his aides, together with his sympathizers are never named as coconspirators, merely readers are left gratis to infer their involvement.

The express popularity of frame-up theories close the accident is due inwards percentage to their primal implausibility. Why, critics reasonably ask, would Kennedy non protestation that he was beingness framed? Why would he plead guilty before a local gauge the calendar week after the accident?

Why would he publicly acknowledge guilt inwards his televised vocalization communication subsequently the same day? Why, inwards other words, would Kennedy make the conspirators’ locomote for them yesteryear confessing to a reputation-damaging human activity that he knew he did non commit?

Conspiracy to Shield Kennedy

The most widely held conspiracy theories close the accident suggest that Kennedy conspired with others to embrace upwardly the truthful extent of his guilt. Their popularity reflects the widespread see that the wealthy, the powerful, together with the well-connected tin easily escape penalization for their crimes. The Kennedy household unit of measurement possessed wealth, power, together with connections inwards abundance, together with their willingness to role all 3 to their wages is good established.

The perceived incongruity of criminal offense together with penalization inwards the Chappaquiddick case—a two-month suspended judgement for acts resulting inwards the expiry of a immature woman—led many to conclude that wealth together with privilege had triumphed again. These perceptions ran peculiarly rigid alongside longtime residents of Martha’s Vineyard, fueled yesteryear suspicion of wealthy, privileged vacationers from the mainland.

One variation of this theory has Kennedy conspiring with associates to arts and crafts an “official” floor close the accident that would minimize his guilt. Washington Post columnist Jack Anderson suggested inwards 1969, for example, that Kennedy asked Joseph Gargan together with Hugh Markham—two longtime associates who were also at the party—to prevarication to police trace together with say that Gargan or Kopechne herself had been at the bicycle of the car. Leo Damore gave the theory novel life inwards his 1988 majority Senatorial Privilege.

Many residents of Martha’s Vineyard reckon testify of a similar conspiracy inwards Kennedy’s claims that he turned toward the span without realizing it, dived on the wreck inwards an endeavour to salvage Kopechne, together with subsequently swam the channel separating Chappaquiddick from Edgartown.

They believe that the claims are plainly absurd—a heroic fiction created yesteryear Kennedy together with others to embrace an uglier reality inwards which Kennedy, drunk, fled the scene of the accident together with used his connections to slip dorsum quietly to his Edgartown hotel without rousing the ferryman together with attracting attention.

H5N1 2nd variation of the theory suggests that the Kennedy household unit of measurement used their wealth, power, or political connections to subvert, divert, or obstruct official investigations of the accident.

Commentators who believe inwards such a conspiracy debate that the postaccident investigations were inadequate at best together with negligent at worst—failings best explained non yesteryear disinterest merely yesteryear active tampering. Why, they ask, did the Edgartown police trace non thoroughly search the surface area some the accident scene for telltale physical evidence?

Why did the nation police trace lieutenant who headed the investigation for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts neglect to inquiry key witnesses together with discourage the district attorney from ordering an autopsy? Why did the gauge inwards accuse of the grand jury investigation laid the Blue Planet rules inwards such ways that virtually guaranteed it would live ineffective?

The slipshod investigation together with prosecution were, they argue, orchestrated yesteryear Kennedy together with others inwards a serial of telephone calls made inwards the fourth dimension betwixt the accident together with the kickoff study of it to the police. The extent of the family’s ability over Massachusetts politics made it possible for them to rapidly together with efficiently subvert the criminal judge system.

Theories close conspiracies to conceal the nature of Kennedy’s offense together with deflect the total forcefulness of the law from him are the to the lowest degree spectacular of the 3 types. They are also the most plausible: the investigation was, inwards retrospect, seriously flawed.

Conspiracy-theory critics such as James Lange together with Katherine DeWitt take away hold noted, however, that the flaws are non inwards themselves proof of conspiracy. They tin live explained as good yesteryear to a greater extent than mundane causes: incompetence, laziness, the distraction of to a greater extent than pressing cases, or the biases of item individuals.

Conspiracy to Stage the Incident

The 3rd type of conspiracy theory combines elements of the kickoff ii types. Like the kickoff type of theory, it proposes that the accident was staged; similar the second, it accuses Kennedy of conspiring to embrace upwardly the truthful extent of his guilt. Specifically, the 3rd type of theory suggests that Kennedy together with several unopen friends engineered the “accident” inwards lodge to embrace upwardly other misdeeds.

Kenneth Kappel, inwards his 1989 majority Chappaquiddick Revealed, begins with the premise that Kennedy must take away hold been drunkard yesteryear the fourth dimension he together with Kopechne got into the car. He suggests that an alcohol-impaired Kennedy ran the auto off the route (not the bridge), causing it to curl over, leaving Kennedy wound together with Kopechne unconscious.

Kennedy together with several friends, believing that Kopechne was already dead, righted the auto together with pushed it off the span into the pond inwards lodge to cover the testify long plenty for Kennedy to sober up. Kopechne regained consciousness after the auto striking the pond and, unable to escape, drowned. Kappel’s theory therefore has Kennedy together with his coconspirators unintentionally committing manslaughter inwards the procedure of trying to cover the much less (legally) serious criminal offense of drunken driving.

H5N1 2nd variation of this theory takes it significantly further, positing that Kennedy murdered Kopechne together with and so drove (or pushed) the auto off the span to conceal the fact. Many commentators on the accident assume that (despite his denials) Kennedy had or sought sexual activity with Kopechne.

Adherents of the murder-cover-up theory oft expand that supposition into the speculation that the couplet had a prior sexual come across that left Kopechne pregnant. Pregnancy would, the adherents argue, supply Kennedy with a motive for the alleged murder together with cover-up. Zad Rust’s 1971 majority Teddy Bare strongly implies—but, presumably to avoid a libel suit, does non explicitly claim—both pregnancy together with murder, covered upwardly yesteryear a staged accident.

Neither Kappell, nor Rust, nor whatever of the less prominent advocates of such theories tin adequately concern human relationship for how Kennedy together with a few friends could force the auto into the water. The bridge’s 4-inch-high rails—though no barrier to a vehicle driven at twenty miles per hour—would live a substantial obstruction to a 2-ton vehicle beingness pushed uphill yesteryear 3 or 4 men struggling to divulge buy on a dirt-and-gravel route inwards casual shoes.

Nor tin such theories concern human relationship for the dark tire marks that law enforcement officers observed on the span deck the forenoon after the accident. The marks suggest a auto skidding with locked brakes—an icon fully compatible with an accident, merely virtually impossible to phase on the spur of the moment.

Allegations that Kopechne was strangled to expiry are as hard to reconcile with the failure of the local medical examiner to divulge whatever marks on her pharynx when he examined her torso the forenoon after the accident. Allegations that she was important yesteryear Kennedy are as dubious, together with as inconsistent with established facts.