The Region - News from Oct. 7, 1985

Attorneys for Long Beach physician Dr. Jeffrey MacDonald, who was convicted of the 1970 slayings of his pregnant wife and two children, will seek a new trial today. A three-judge panel of the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., will hear the latest arguments in the 15-year-old murder cases highlighted in the 1983 book and subsequent television movie “Fatal Vision.” In 1979, a federal court jury in Raleigh, N.C., convicted the former Green Beret captain, who is serving three consecutive life sentences. He maintains the murders at Ft. Bragg, N.C., were committed by drug-crazed hippies. An earlier motion for retrial was denied by U.S. District Judge Franklin Dupree, who presided at MacDonald’s 1979 trial. MacDonald’s lawyers, Brian O’Neill and Myrna Greenberg of Santa Monica, say they have new evidence, including statements from 35 witnesses substantiating MacDonald’s version.