An appeals court refused to allow prosecutors use Michelle Lodzinski's 1994 statement to the FBI regarding her fake kidnapping against her at her upcoming murder trial.
NEW BRUNSWICK -- An appeals court has refused to allow prosecutors to let a jury hear a statement Michelle Lodzinski gave to the FBI when she claimed she was kidnapped--an event that represented a strange turn in the investigation into her son's death.
The appellate panel, ruling Thursday, upheld a decision by Superior Court Judge Dennis Nieves that excluded Lodzinski's statement made in 1994 as being too prejudicial and too far removed from May 25, 1991 when Lodzinski's five-year-old son, Timothy Wiltsey, disappeared.
Lodzinski said that she was forcibly taken by FBI agents to Detroit in 1994, three years after Wiltsey's disappearance. But, she later admitted that it was a hoax, and she was sentenced to three years probation.
Wiltsey's remains were found in a marshy area in Raritan Center in Edison 11 months after his disappearance.
Lodzinski was charged with her son's murder in August 2014 and is awaiting trial. The trial, which was supposed to start next week, has been put off until Feb. 16, 2016.
She originally told police that she and Wiltsey went to a carnival in Sayreville the evening of May 25, 1991, and he disappeared when she went to a stand to buy soda.
Middlesex County Assistant Prosecutor Christie Bevacqua argued that the 1994 statements "really have to do with her credibility."
Lodzinski, formerly of South Amboy, went so far as to print up fake business cards for an FBI agent, which prosecutors argued, showed a consciousness of guilt.
But, the appellate judges agreed with Nieves "the evidence's probative value weighed against the undue prejudice to defendant and potential distraction to and confusion of the jurors."
The appellate judges also upheld Nieves' decision to exclude the testimony of an expert on why mothers kill their children.
Sue Epstein may be reached at sepstein@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @susan_epstein. Find NJ.com on Facebook.