School founder recalls Skakel suspension

NORWALK, Conn. – Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel was once suspended from a private school in Vermont after threatening a teacher’s wife with a ski pole, the school’s founder said Sunday.

Richard Wright, founder of The Vershire School, said that Skakel was “sent home” after threatening to strike a woman during a confrontation in 1978 in a dormitory staircase.

“He was aggressive and threatened the wife of a staff person, and we don’t allow that,” Wright told The Associated Press on Sunday. “He was sent home and told to consult with a psychiatrist or psychologist to control impulsive behavior.”

Skakel’s attorney said his client “categorically denies anything of this nature.”

Skakel, now 41, never returned to the school, instead enrolling in a substance abuse treatment center in Maine, Wright said.

The incident was first reported in The Advocate of Stamford on Sunday.

“I think he raised the ski pole, but he didn’t swing or anything,” Wright told the newspaper. “As I recall, it was a trivial dorm control issue. She told him not to make noise, or something like that, and he was feeling nasty.”

Wright said he never considered Skakel a violent person: “Rude perhaps, but not violent.”

Skakel’s attorney, Michael Sherman, did not immediately returns calls for comment Sunday.

He told The Advocate that his client never threatened anybody and left the school because of failing grades.

Jane Taupier, the woman whom he allegedly threatened, declined to comment to The Advocate, saying it didn’t have anything to do with the murder case.

Taupier and her husband lived in a dorm with Skakel and 25 other students, Wright said.

Prosecutors are expected to rely heavily on statements made by students at the substance abuse center in Poland, Maine, where Skakel was sent after leaving Vershire. Two former students said Skakel confessed to the Moxley murder while attending the Elan School.

It was not clear Sunday if the incident in Vermont would be brought up at Skakel’s trial.

Testimony is slated to begin May 7. The state’s list of potential witnesses does not include anyone connected with The Vershire School, which closed in 1988.