TIME
January
22, 1990
January 11,
1990
Confusion Grows Over Boston Murder
By FOX BUTTERFIELD, SPECIAL TO THE NEW YORK TIMES
LEAD: Confusion
over the case of Charles Stuart increased today as an insurance company denied
a report that it had prepared a $480,000 check for Mr. Stuart, whose pregnant
wife was shot to death last October. Confusion over the case of Charles Stuart
increased today as an insurance company denied a report that it had prepared a
$480,000 check for Mr. Stuart, whose pregnant wife was shot to death last
October. A spokesman for the Prudential Insurance Company of America, Joseph A.
Vecchione, said an exhaustive computer search by
Prudential could find no policy issued in the name of Carol Stuart, Mr.
Stuart's wife, nor any check made out to Mr. Stuart.''There
simply is no check,'' Mr. Vecchione said by telephone
from the company's offices in Newark. The Boston Globe, citing anonymous sources, reported
today that Prudential had processed the check to Mr. Stuart for a claim on his
wife's insurance by the time Mr. Stuart committed suicide last Thursday. Mr.
Stuart leaped from a bridge over Boston harbor after he was identified as a suspect in the
case. Richard P. Gulla, a spokesman for The Globe,
said, ''As of this point we stand by what was reported in this morning's
paper.''
Motive for Murder Reported
The Globe also reported that
the police now believe Mr. Stuart's motive for killing his wife was to obtain
insurance money to finance a new career as a restaurant owner. The paper's
account was prominently featured across the top of the front page under a bold
two-line headline as the Boston
news media continued its intensive coverage of the case. The paper said the
police had found materials in his house in suburban Reading on how to start a business and were told by friends
of Mr. Stuart that he planned to open a restaurant. Mr. Stuart had been the
manager of the Kakas & Sons fur shop on fashionable Newbury Street in Boston. Relatives say he attended Northeast Vocational High
School in
his hometown of Revere, where he studied culinary arts, and had worked as a
cook in several small restaurants in Revere. At one of them, the now-defunct Driftwood, he met
his wife. Despite a series of revelations over the past week since Mr. Stuart,
29 years old, committed suicide, there are still some crucial unanswered
questions about the Stuart case. The case aroused national interest and
inflamed racial passions in Boston
when Mr. Stuart asserted that he and his wife had been shot by a black gunman
shortly after the couple left a birthing class at a Boston hospital on Oct. 23.
Unresolved Questions
Last week, Mr. Stuart's
younger brother, Matthew, 23 years old, suddenly turned the case upside down
when he told the police that by prearrangement with his brother he had picked
up the .38 caliber revolver used in the shooting and Mrs. Stuart's handbag from
the car where she laying dying. Mr. Stuart sat in the same car with a stomach
wound that the police now believe was self-inflicted.
Among the unresolved questions in the case are these:
* How much insurance did Mr.
Stuart stand to collect from his wife's death? He had already received $82,000
from a policy taken out from the firm where she worked as a lawyer, and he had
applied to collect on a separate $100,000 policy from the Travelers Life
Insurance Company. The police have told reporters there are more policies but
will not provide details.
* If Charles Stuart shot
himself intentionally as part of an elaborate and tragic hoax, why did he wound
himself in the stomach causing a near fatal injury? Mr. Stuart remained in Boston City Hospital for six weeks where he had to undergo two operations
to repair his wound, and he ended up with a colostomy bag. A spokesman for the
hospital said today that the surgeon who operated on Mr. Stuart ''at no time
suspected the wound was self-inflicted.''
* Did Charles Stuart tell his
brother Matthew that they were only going to pull off a fake robbery of his
wife's jewels for an insurance scam, as Matthew Stuart has told the police, or
did he hint at a darker purpose? When Matthew Stuart arrived to pick up the gun
and handbag, did he see Mrs. Stuart's body or that Charles Stuart was badly
bleeding in the car. If not, why not?
*When did Charles Stuart's
three brothers and two sisters learn about his role in the killing? The Boston
Globe has repeatedly reported that some members of the family learned about
Charles Stuart's actions within three days of the incident. The Stuarts have
avoided the media since Charles Stuart committed suicide.
The Stuarts' actions could
determine whether they are criminally charged in the case. Under Massachusetts law, a person who learns about a crime after the
fact, and who only has knowledge of it, cannot be held legally responsible. But
if a family member discussed the crime beforehand or became involved in a
conspiracy to cover it up, he or she would become an accessory, criminal
lawyers not involved in the case say. The Globe today carried what it described
as the transcript of a telephone call from Michael Stuart, another brother, to
one of two sisters in the Stuart family, Shelley Yandoli,
in which they discussed telling their parents about Charles Stuart's real
actions. The call was said to have been made on Jan. 2, two days before Charles
Stuart committed suicide, and was automatically recorded at the Revere Fire
Department where Michael Stuart worked.
Shelley: ''We're all meeting
here right now. We're going to Mom's.''
Michael: ''What are you going
to tell them?''
Shelley: We're going to tell
them we know that Chuck was involved. We're not going to say that he killed
her.'' Michael: ''Yeh, right.
Shelley: ''O.K.''
Michael: ''Wow.''
Shelley: ''I know, Mike, get
ready.''
Michael: Sigh.
Issue of Romantic Link
Another unanswered question
is the relationship between Charles Stuart and Deborah Allen, a 22-year-old
graduate student in business administration at Babson College who had worked at the fur store last summer with Mr.
Stuart. The police have told reporters they believe there was a romantic link
between the two and that this might help explain the murder. But Thomas E.
Dwyer Jr., a lawyer for the Allen family, said today that the romance was all
on Mr. Stuart's side and that Ms. Allen had spurned his advances.
January 12,
1990
Boston Murder
Suspect Sought a Brother's Help, Lawyer Says
By CONSTANCE L. HAYS, SPECIAL TO THE NEW YORK TIMES
LEAD:
Charles Stuart asked one of his brothers to help him kill his wife ''weeks
before'' she was fatally shot on Oct. 23, a lawyer for the brother said today.
Charles Stuart asked one of his brothers to help him kill his wife ''weeks
before'' she was fatally shot on Oct. 23, a lawyer for the brother said today.
But the lawyer, Richard I. Clayman, said the response
of his client, Michael Stuart, was, '' 'I'm not getting involved in any sort of
crazy thing you're talking about.' '' The lawyer, who faced reporters and
camera crews today with Michael and Mark Stuart and their sisters, Shelley Yandoli and Neysa Porter,
insisted that there had been no ''family conspiratorial scenario'' to support
Charles Stuart's tale of being abducted, robbed and shot by a black gunman as
he and his wife, Carol, left Brigham and Women's Hospital here. The news
conference was not attended by another brother, Matthew Stuart, who went to the
police on Jan. 3 with the evidence that made his brother Charles a prime
suspect. The next day Charles Stuart leaped to his death from a Boston Harbor bridge.
Legal Questions Raised
Mr. Clayman
said that Michael Stuart, a Revere
firefighter, knew three days after the shooting that Charles Stuart had been
involved in the death of his wife. But Mr. Clayman
said other members of the Stuart family had not learned of Charles Stuart's
involvement until the period from New Year's Day to Jan. 3. The disclosures
raised new legal and moral questions about whether the brothers and sisters
acted properly once they knew of falsehoods in Charles Stuart's tale about the
circumstances that led to the death of his wife, who was seven months pregnant,
and their son Christopher, who lived for 17 days after his delivery by
emergency Caesarean section. At the news conference, Mr. Clayman
was asked about a conversation between Charles and Michael Stuart, rumored here
for several days, and replied, ''There may have been an early, disjointed,
vague conversation by, between Charles Stuart and my client Michael Stuart, weeks
before Oct. 23, which at that time had no significance to Michael.'' Michael
Stuart's response, he said, was ''a definitive, 'I don't know what you're
talking about but I'm not getting involved in any sort of crazy thing you're
talking about.' ''
'It Had Some Significance'
Mr. Clayman
said that, upon reflection, his client's conversation about killing Charles
Stuart's wife now might seem to be a sign that all was not right. ''I reviewed
it with him and it doesn't have a hell of a lot of significance now,'' Mr. Clayman said. ''But in retrospect, after examining all the
data, an argument can be made that it should have had, or why didn't it, or at
least now I think someone could argue that it had some significance.'' The
lawyer added: ''Mrs. Yandoli and Mrs. Porter and Mark
Stuart never knew anything directly or indirectly relative to the homicide
until at least Jan. 1, 1990. This family wants it to be known that they had no information about
what their brother Charles may have done until the aforementioned time.'' But
Michael Stuart has told investigators he and his brother Matthew had discussed
the shooting by Oct. 26, Mr. Clayman said. ''Within
three days of the Oct. 23 homicide, my client Michael Stuart received
information from Matthew Stuart,'' the lawyer said. The Stuart family members
who appeared with Mr. Clayman today are scheduled to
testify before a Suffolk County grand jury on Friday, he added.
'Hands Are Legally Clean'
Mr. Clayman
said his client had broken no laws. ''I am comfortable after an examination of
this entire scenario that there was no violation of the law,'' he said. ''His
hands are legally clean.'' Under Massachusetts law, a person who learns of a crime after the fact,
and who only has knowledge of it, cannot be held legally responsible. But if a
family member discussed the crime beforehand or became involved in a conspiracy
to cover it up, he or she would become an accessory, criminal lawyers not
involved in the case say. Marvin N. Geller, a lawyer for Carol Stuart's family,
said the family had no comment on Mr. Clayman's
statements. A lawyer for Matthew Stuart, the brother who went
to the police. also would not comment. Thomas
E. Dwyer Jr., the lawyer for Deborah Allen, a 23-year-old graduate student who
worked at the Kakas & Sons fur shop in Boston, where Charles Stuart was the
manager, issued a statement today saying she was ''never romantically
involved'' with Mr. Stuart. ''Mr. Stuart asked me to call daily and visit
him,'' the statement said. ''I told him that I felt it was inappropriate for me
to visit because this was a time for family, but I agreed to telephone him.''
Telephone Calls Confirmed
The statement by Ms. Allen
also confirmed that she had telephoned Mr. Stuart frequently after the
shooting, using his telephone credit card number. There were three reasons, she
said in the statement. ''First, because of my school and work schedule, I
frequently called him from pay telephones at Babson College. Second, I was concerned about he cost of our lengthy
telephone calls, which I knew I could not afford on a student's budget. Third,
I knew my mother was uneasy about my contact with someone associated with a
highly publicized violent crime. Although I believed I had an obligation to
continue to support Mr. Stuart, I wanted to avoid unnecessarily worrying my
mother when she received our telephone bills at home.'' The statement
continued: ''At some point in late December it became apparent to me that Mr.
Stuart no longer needed my support. I firmly told Mr. Stuart that as a friend
there was nothing more I could do for him. That was my last conversation with
him.'' The statement was accompanied by statements from Ms. Allen's boyfriend,
Brian Heffernan, and another friend, Beth Madison. Both confirmed what Ms.
Allen's statement said about the telephone calls and the breakoff
point. A spokesman for the Suffolk County District Attorney's office, which is
conducting the investigation, said the district attorney already knew the
information Mr. Clayman disclosed today. As to
whether any laws had been broken by the Stuart siblings, the spokesman, John M.
Julian, said, ''We're going to let the grand jury look at the evidence and
decide if any charges are brought.'' Ms. Allen said in her statement that she
had received gifts from Charles Stuart. ''My friendship with Mr. Stuart was not
romantic,'' the statement said. ''I socialized with him both alone and with
others on a few occasions. The only presents I received from Mr. Stuart were a
pair of sneakers, a sweatshirt and a joke gift.''
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