MacDonald continues appeals in 'Fatal Vision' killings
A month after a federal judge denied a motion for a new trial for Jeffrey MacDonald, the Army surgeon who was convicted of killing his pregnant wife and two daughters at their Fort Bragg home in 1970, MacDonald on Thursday filed yet another motion seeking another trial.
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MacDonald, 70, has repeatedly claimed that his family was attacked during a home invasion by four hippies seeking drugs, and the case spawned a book and television miniseries titled “Fatal Vision," and sought a new trial based on what defense attorneys said was new DNA evidence and witness testimony.
Senior U.S. District Judge James Fox ruled that MacDonald failed to establish any merits to his claim that he's not guilty of the murders.
In his latest motion, MacDonald has asked Fox to grant him permission to appeal the ruling to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in order to challenge the findings of an FBI analyst.
The analyst said blond hairs found in a brush in the MacDonald home belonged to a doll and weren't from a wig, but MacDonald's defense noted that the U.S. Department of Justice has criticized the analyst and his testing procedures in recent years. Prosecutors never disclosed those criticisms to the defense during several rounds of appeals, according to the motion.
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