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Post by Graveyardbride on Aug 8, 2017 5:01:30 GMT -5
Friends’ Testimony Unfavorable to DurstOne by one, the prosecutor in the murder case against Robert A. Durst has brought reluctant witnesses to court to obtain testimony in a case that spans the country, 36 years and at least two deaths. But Emily Altman, a longtime friend of Durst’s who took the stand for the second day Wednesday, July 26, was the first who had waged a fierce legal battle to avoid testifying.
The now frail Durst, 74, is charged with shooting a close friend in the back of the head in her Los Angeles home 17 years ago. Prosecutors contend that he shot Susan Berman (above with Durst) to prevent her revealing to the authorities the role she played in helping him cover up the disappearance and murder of his first wife, Kathleen “Kathie” McCormack Durst, in 1982.
Under two days of relentless questioning by Deputy District Attorney John Lewin, Mrs. Altman often could not recall the particulars of what Durst said or did decades ago with respect to either Berman or his former wife. But late Wednesday afternoon, she made a startling revelation: Durst had told her that he was in Los Angeles around the time Berman was murdered in her Benedict Canyon home.
The authorities have long known that Durst flew to San Francisco four days before Berman was killed, however, Durst, who insists he knows nothing about Berman’s murder or what happened to his first wife, has never acknowledged to investigators that he had gone to Los Angeles before returning to New York. According to Mrs. Altman, Durst told her that while he was in Los Angeles, he stayed at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, which was less than three miles from Berman’s home.
The day Berman was murdered, December 23, 2000, the Beverly Hills police were sent an anonymous note alerting them to the presence of a “cadaver” at Berman’s home. Asked whether Durst’s admission that he was in Los Angeles had prompted any suspicions in her mind, Mrs. Altman replied, “No, because she was his best friend.”
Emily Altman is married to Stewart Altman, who grew up with Durst in Scarsdale, a New York suburb. The three have been close friends for decades. Mr. Altman, who is expected to testify August 28, introduced Durst to his first wife (who is presumed dead) and he is godfather to the Altmans’ son, Howard. Mr. Altman, a lawyer, has represented Durst on real estate and civil matters, as well as criminal matters ranging from trespassing to murder. Mrs. Altman is the sole employee of her husband’s Long Island law firm. In an attempt to avoid testifying at what is called a conditional examination in California, the Altmans had argued their conversations with Durst were protected by lawyer-client privilege.
On Dec. 24, 2000, Susan Berman was found dead in her house. Initially, suspicion fell on both her elderly landlady, Delia “Dee” Baskin Schiffer, and manager, Nyle Brenner, But it wasn’t long before the authorities began looking at Durst.
Nevertheless, Durst participated in the making of a 2015 six-part HBO documentary, The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst. At the end of the final episode, he uttered the words, “What did I do? Killed them all, of course.” Just hours before the broadcast, Durst was arrested in New Orleans on a murder warrant issued in Los Angeles for killing Susan Berman.
Under California law, a prosecutor can examine witnesses age 65 and older before trial, and the prosecution has brought a series of witnesses to the stand. They also face cross-examination by Durst’s formidable defense team, though it is by no means certain that all, or any, of the testimony will be admissible at trial.
At times, Mrs. Altman wept on the stand and accused Lewin of bullying her. But the questioning continued. On Wednesday, Lewin questioned her extensively concerning conversations she had with Jaclyn Cosgrove about Durst during the past 17 years and attempted to extract from her what she may have revealed in confidence. Repeatedly, the witness said she did not recall what she had said.
In a 2001 article cited by Lewin, Mrs. Altman was quoted as describing Durst as someone incapable of violence: “He’s the most kindhearted person I’ve ever met in my life.” But when Lewin asked whether this was still her opinion, she answered, “Not quite so much.”
But this wasn’t all Emily Altman revealed. She testified that Kathie Durst told her about an affair with a “blues musician.” Mrs. Altman subsequently discussed the matter with Bob Durst, with whom she had been friends for 45 years. She recalled telling Durst, “I think Kathie has been seeing this guy” and suggesting the possibility that Mrs. Durst left her husband to be with the boyfriend.
Durst has denied having anything to do with the disappearance of his wife, whose body has never been located and he has never been charged in her death.
In April, Miriam Barnes, a close friend of Susan Berman’s, testified that one night Berman said, “I’m going to tell you something, but I need you not to ask me any questions. I did something today.” According to Barnes, Berman did not elaborate, but added, “If anything ever happens to me, Bobby did it.”
On the same day Ms. Barnes testified, James Varian, a retired New York police detective, read a report he and his former partner completed after interviewing Anne Doyle – a neighbor who lived near the Dursts in a New York apartment building – concerning the disappearance of Kathie Durst. Mrs. Doyle told the officers that in late 1981, Mrs. Durst, wearing pajamas, climbed out of her own window onto a balcony and knocked at her window, explaining that Durst “beat her and wanted to kill her.”
In February, advertising executive Nick Chavin took the stand and testified that Durst admitted killing his wife and intimated he killed Susan Berman. Chavin was a close friend of both Durst’s and Berman’s and recalled that following a dinner in 2014, he questioned Durst about Susan’s murder and Durst allegedly replied, “It was her or me.” Chavin also claimed that after Kathie Durst’s disappearance, Berman told him, “Bob killed Kathie,” claiming Durst confessed to her and explained his wife’s death had been accidental. Sources: Jaclyn Cosgrove, Reuters, July 26, 2017; Charles V. Bagli, The New York Times, July 26, 2017; Christine Pelisek, People, April 26, 2017; and Andrew Blankstein and Tracy Connor, NBC, April 25, 2017.
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Post by jane on Aug 9, 2017 19:09:32 GMT -5
I read somewhere that Susan Berman may have been going to write a book about what happened to Durst's wife and if what this woman and man said is true, it sounds like she was about to write something that would be harmful to Durst and that's why he said that it was "her or me."
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Post by Graveyardbride on Aug 29, 2017 17:54:35 GMT -5
More Damning Testimony in Durst Pretrial
Susan Berman, whom New York real estate heir Robert Durst is accused of murdering, told her boyfriend that Durst had killed his own wife, Kathleen, the boyfriend testified Monday in court. Testifying in Los Angeles Superior Court, Paul Kaufman said Berman made the surprising statement almost in passing as they flew from LA to New York to meet Durst in 1990. On that day, Kaufman said, he and Berman – who were both in the entertainment industry and working on a play together – were kicking around plots for murder or organized crime storylines. “We were talking about scripts,” he testified. “She said, ‘By the way, you know Mr. Durst killed his wife.’” Kaufman told Deputy District Attorney Habib Balian he did not ask for any more information. “We were at the time writing and playing games: What if this happens or that happens? I did not particularly believe it did happen or did not happen.”
Law enforcement officials have long believed Durst did kill his beautiful young wife, who vanished in January 1982.
Los Angeles prosecutors have charged the eccentric multimillionaire with shooting Berman in December 2000 to keep her from telling New York investigators what she knew about Kathleen Durst’s unsolved disappearance nearly two decades earlier.
Robert Durst, 74 and frail, is to go on trial for Berman’s murder sometime next year. During sporadic hearings this year, Superior Court Judge Mark Windham has allowed the lead prosecutor, Deputy District Attorney John Lewin, to examine ill or elderly potential witnesses to preserve their testimony.
One such witness, Nick Chavin, testified that his longtime friend effectively confessed to killing Berman and implied that he’d killed Kathleen Durst. Two other witnesses supported the theory that Berman had helped Durst cover up his wife’s death, and may have died as a result.
Kathie Durst, a medical student, was last seen on Jan. 31, 1982, according to prosecutors. But the dean of her medical school has testified that he received a phone call from her the next day, Feb. 1, saying she was ill. However, Hollywood producer Lynda Obst told the court that Berman admitted having posed as Kathleen Durst to make the call to the medical school. And Miriam Barnes recalled that early in 1982, her close friend and neighbor Berman anxiously told her that she “did something today for Bobby,” referring to Robert Durst, and that “if anything ever happens to me, Bobby did it.”
Kaufman, a producer and investment adviser, was romantically involved with Berman and lived in her Brentwood house from the late 1980s to the early 90s. They worked together on a project to make a Broadway musical about the 19th century French scandal known as the Dreyfus affair. During those years, Kaufman said, Berman became a surrogate mother to his son and daughter, then entering their teen years.
Like other witnesses, Kaufman said Berman was a larger than life personality who sometimes would embellish, exaggerate or make things up. On cross-examination by Durst defense attorney David Chesnoff of Las Vegas, Kaufman agreed that Berman once told him that the Mob had killed her father – who was a high official in Las Vegas organized crime – and that her father had killed her mother. Neither was true. “Basically, she was capable of saying all kinds of things. That was part of her charm,” Kaufman said.
Also testifying Monday was Richard Markey, an elderly writer and photographer who was one of the last people to see Berman alive. They went out to dinner and a movie on Dec. 22, 2000, which is the day police suspect Berman was shot in the head inside her home in Los Angeles’s Benedict Canyon. Markey described Berman as an “unusual” person who was very smart, curious and knowledgeable about the world, but “overly dramatic” and beset by many phobias. One of those phobias was personal security. When Markey went to see her about a project, he would call ahead, yet when he knocked on her door, she would peek out the window at him and demand he identify himself.
Durst’s supporters and defense team have suggested that Berman was shot by a stranger. But Markey said she would never let someone she didn’t know into her home.
Markey initially suspected that Berman’s manager, Nyle Brenner, may have been the killer. She’d had a “turbulent,” “love-hate” relationship with Brenner, he said. Markey testified that Brenner left him an odd phone message telling him of Berman’s murder and warning him that police would be asking him very personal questions. In that message, Brenner said he planned on not cooperating with investigators, Markey said. Brenner told him he had gone to Berman’s house after police left, crawled in through a window and noticed fingerprint dust scattered around, Markey revealed.
Markey also described going to lunch with Robert Durst and other friends after a memorial service for Berman, which Durst did not attend. He recalled that over lunch Durst did not talk about his late friend, but complained about being hounded by New York detectives who were re-investigating Kathleen Durst’s 1982 disappearance.
On Tuesday, Durst’s private attorney and high school buddy Stewart Altman is to testify about conversations he had with Durst when his client was in custody in New Orleans; Galveston, Texas; and Pennsylvania. Altman’s wife and legal secretary, Emily Altman, testified about some of those instances during a week of hearings in July.
Windham ruled that Durst and the Altmans had waived attorney-client privilege over some of the conversations. However, the Altmans’ attorneys, Marilyn Bednarski and David S. McLane, of Kaye, McLane, Bednarski & Litt in Pasadena, were expected to argue a motion Tuesday to try to prevent Stewart Altman from testifying.
Source: Don Debenedictis, CourthouseNews, August 29, 2017.
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Post by kitty on Aug 30, 2017 18:32:36 GMT -5
What all these people are saying is interesting, but isn't it what is called hearsay in court?
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Post by Graveyardbride on Dec 20, 2017 2:52:57 GMT -5
New Tip in Disappearance of Kathie Durst
New York police say they have received a new lead in the 35-year-old investigation of Robert Durst, but a lawyer representing the family of his presumed-dead first wife says cops are creating “the illusion” of an ongoing case. Missing Persons Detective Monty Velez swears in an affidavit filed in Manhattan Supreme Court the department received a new tip in November about the 1982 disappearance of Kathie Durst. “Although Ms. Durst disappeared nearly 36 years ago, her case is the subject of an open law enforcement investigation, as NYPD continues to actively follow-up on leads that may come in,” Velez says. “In fact, NYPD received a new lead just last month, which I am actively pursuing. Ultimately, if NYPD determines that a crime was committed, a perpetrator may be apprehended and a prosecution can still occur.”
The revelation came as part of a lawsuit pitting a lawyer for Kathie Durst’s sisters against the NYPD. Their attorney, Bob Abrams, seeks access to the NYPD’s case file on her disappearance for separate litigation against Robert Durst in Nassau County. The police denied the request, citing an ongoing investigation. The lawsuit seeking documents from the investigation, filed in October, alleged that detectives worked with an ex-officer hired by the Durst family to cover up the demented real estate scion’s role in his wife’s death. Kathie Durst was officially declared dead earlier this year, though her body has never been found.
The police department is “grasping at straws,” Abrams wrote in papers arguing the department should turn over the Durst case file. The NYPD has “not actively pursued and/or investigated Kathie’s disappearance for over 30 years and have no intention of conducting a further investigation,” he continued.
Robert Durst, 74, is facing trial in Los Angeles for killing his best friend, Susan Berman, in 2000 out of fear she was about to speak to investigators about his wife’s disappearance. Former NYPD Detective Michael Struk testified last month in Los Angeles that any suggestion the department protected Durst was “bullshit.” But he also admitted to sleeping with a witness three decades ago.
Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney John Lewin called the NYPD investigation “well-intentioned” but “incompetent.”
The police insist their investigation continues, citing Velez’s sworn statement as justification for rejecting Abrams’ Freedom of Information Law request for the case file.
Abrams, of the firm Abrams Fensterman, says in papers the timing of the new tip is “curious.”
Kathie’s brother, Jim McCormack, who is not a party to the Nassau County case, told the Daily News the supposed tip “doesn't pass the sniff test.” He claimed he hasn’t spoken to New York investigators since 2001. “If there really is a tip, if they’re sincere about pursuing closure and justice, I would be more than happy to have them call me,” he said. “I would love to at least have a conversation.”
Prosecutors in California claim Durst killed pal Susan Berman, 55, in her Los Angeles bungalow 17 years ago because he was worried she was about to meet with New York prosecutors to discuss the disappearance of his first wife. Prosecutors contend Durst killed his wife, hid her body and recruited Berman to help cover his tracks. They say Berman posed as Kathie Durst and called in sick to her Bronx-based medical school the morning after she was last seen alive.
Durst has pled not guilty in the pending murder case. His lawyers claim he has no idea what happened to Kathie or who killed Berman.
Sources: Nancy Dillon and Stephen Rex Brown, The New York Daily News, December 19, 2017; and Nancy Dillon, The New York Daily News, November 28, 2017.
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Post by Kate on Dec 23, 2017 4:17:05 GMT -5
Why would the police say they got a tip if they didn't?
If her body is buried in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey, they'll never find her. It's too bad Susan Berman didn't leave something in a safety deposit box, or with someone that she could trust, about what happened to Durst's wife and where her body was. If she was afraid that he was going to kill her, you'd think that a smart woman like she was supposed to be would have done something like that so that he couldn't afford to kill her.
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Post by Graveyardbride on Mar 28, 2018 2:07:29 GMT -5
Prosecutors Seek to Admit Hearsay Evidence, Prior Bad Acts in Durst Murder Trial
Prosecutors in the Los Angeles murder case against eccentric New York real estate heir Robert Durst want his victim’s words to help send him to prison. Prosecutors filed almost 400 pages of documents Friday, March 9, to support their argument that Susan Berman’s comments to friends before she was killed in December 2000 should be admitted to demonstrate Durst had reason to kill Berman to prevent her telling what she knew about the disappearance of his wife, Kathleen McCormack Durst, in 1982.
Defense lawyers maintain the statements are hearsay and inadmissible. However, Deputy District Attorney John Lewin said Durst forfeited the right to challenge the statements because he killed Berman to prevent her testimony. “Silence, like a cancer, grows,” Lewin wrote, borrowing a lyric from “Sounds of Silence,” Simon and Garfunkel’s 1966 hit. “Faced now with the prospect of at long last being brought to justice, Defendant tries again to prevent Susan’s voice from being heard. His attempt to prohibit the jury from learning what she said about him killing his wife is the most recent chapter in Defendant’s 36-year quest to evade responsibility for the heinous crimes he has committed.”
Berman told friends the real estate tycoon admitted he killed Kathleen “Kathie” Durst, who was in medical school at the time she vanished. Her body has never been found, but she was officially declared dead last year. Berman also told several people, including former Saturday Night Live cast member Laraine Newman, that she provided alibis for Durst because he was her close friend.
Durst, 74, has pled not guilty and denied any part in the woman’s fatal shooting. Berman, a writer and daughter of a Las Vegas mobster, had been close friends with Durst since the 1960s when they were undergraduates at the University of California, Los Angeles.
The motion comes as lawyers in the case prepare for a preliminary hearing next month in Los Angeles Superior Court that will determine if Durst stands trial for murder. It also marks what is likely to be a contentious fight over the admissibility of a wide range of evidence from hearsay witness statements, including those made by Durst, to Lewin’s lengthy interrogation of Durst after his arrest in New Orleans on March 14, 2015, the day before the final episode of the six-part series, The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst, aired on HBO. Durst’ attorneys are also expected to attempt to suppress clips from the documentary, including the dramatic finale when he was caught on a live microphone muttering: “You’re caught! What the hell did I do? Killed them all, of course.” To many, his comments appeared to be a confession to three murders: those of his long-missing wife, Berman and Morris Black, a Texas neighbor, whom he killed and dismembered in 2001. Durst subsequently claimed he was under the influence of methamphetamines when he muttered those words.
Witnesses have testified at a series of pretrial hearings that Berman, despite her close friendship with Durst, feared him, going so far as to tell some people that if anything happened to her, Durst would be responsible. Nathan “Nick” Chavin, a friend to both Berman and Durst, dropped a bombshell during one pretrial hearing when he testified that after following a dinner in New York, Durst admitted he killed Berman. “I had to,” Durst said, according to Chavin. “It was her or me, I had no choice.”
Prosecutors also want to admit evidence of Durst’s past acts of domestic violence. District Attorney Jackie Lacey argued that Durst’s alleged history of physically and emotionally abusing his wife – detailed in a 169-page document that includes hospital records, entries from his wife’s journal, statements from friends and family and Durst’s own statements – are key to connecting him to his former wife’s disappearance. “These acts of domestic violence and emotional abuse, detailed below, are directly relevant to demonstrate that Defendant killed his wife, which in turn is necessary to prove the special circumstance of ‘witness killing’ alleged in this case,” Lacey argues in a motion filed Thursday, March 22. “To meet their burden, the People not only need to prove that Defendant killed Susan, but that he did so to prevent her from testifying to what she knew regarding Defendant’s culpability for Kathie’s death. In essence, everything related to Susan’s murder originates with Defendant’s original killing of his wife and Susan’s knowledge and participation in the coverup.”
A hearing on the People’s motions is scheduled for Monday, April 16.
Durst, who is being held in jail awaiting trial, previously beat a murder charge in the 2001 killing of his neighbor in Galveston, where Durst was living disguised as a mute woman in order to avoid questions by investigators who wanted to reopen the case of his missing wife. While conceding he chopped up Black’s body and tossed it into the sea, he claimed he killed the man in self-defense.
Sources: Brian Melley, KNBC, March 10, 2018, and Dawn C. Chmielewski, Deadline, March 23, 2018.
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Post by kitty on Mar 28, 2018 6:42:17 GMT -5
So there's still no trial in sight. Thanks for keeping us up to date on this one. There's not anything about it in the news.
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Post by Graveyardbride on Apr 18, 2018 23:56:47 GMT -5
Doctor Testifies Kathie Durst Said Husband Had a ‘Homicidal Side’
Kathleen McCormack Durst’s former medical school mentor testified Wednesday that during a conversation in 1981 she told him she lived in fear of her husband, New York real estate tycoon Robert Durst, who she said had a “homicidal side.” Mrs. Durst vanished in 1982 and her body has never been recovered. No one has been charged in connection with her disappearance.
But Robert Durst was charged in the 2000 slaying of best friend Susan Berman, a killing prosecutors contend was to prevent her telling authorities what she knew about Kathie’s disappearance. Prosecutors and McCormack family members believe the real estate magnate also murdered his wife. Durst, 75, has denied killing either woman.
Wednesday’s testimony in a Los Angeles courtroom came during a preliminary hearing to determine if there is enough evidence to hold Durst over for trial in the murder of Berman, 55, an author and the daughter of a Las Vegas mob boss.
The multimillionaire was taken into custody by federal agents in a New Orleans hotel March 14, 2015. A day later, the finale of a six-part HBO documentary about his life, The Jinx, aired, including an audio segment of Durst’s mumbling what some interpreted as a confession to multiple murders – those of Berman, his wife and Morris Black, a neighbor in Texas. Durst said he shot Black in self-defense while trying to defend himself in a struggle and admitted to dismembering the body. He was ultimately acquitted.
His lawyers have argued that Durst’s arrest in connection with Berman’s slaying wasn’t based on facts, but on hype surrounding the documentary.
Peter Wilk – the now-retired surgeon who mentored Kathie Durst years ago – said that of the hundreds of young medical students he’d met, she stood out as mature and poised. But something else about her struck him as well: “She was terrified,” he testified. After she fell behind in school, he met with the extremely emotional student who told him she was divorcing her husband. Wilk claimed she then used a chilling phrase that has always stayed with him: “She said there was a homicidal side to him.”
During his testimony, prosecutors displayed notes Wilk testified he took during the 1981 meeting that included the phrases “in the midst of divorce not very pleasant,” “assaulted” and “homicidal side.” But despite her struggles, Wilk recalled she managed to make up the work and he ultimately wrote her a passing grade for her surgical clerkship.
Since learning of her disappearance, Wilk said he’d harbored guilty since her disappearance. “She had told me she thought she was in danger, she told me she thought her husband might kill her,” the doctor added. “I wonder now, if I could’ve done more to protect her.”
During cross-examination, Chip Lewis, a member of Durst’s defense team, said divorce papers hadn’t been filed at the time Kathleen spoke with Wilk. The attorney also seemed to suggest Kathie’s shaking during the conversation might be attributed to cocaine use rather than her emotions.
On Tuesday, Los Angeles police officer Rashad Sharif testified that on December 24, 2000, he and his partner responded to a home on Benedict Canyon Drive for a welfare check after a concerned neighbor called 911 to report Berman’s backdoor had been left open. He said he and his partner and two other officers discovered a body splayed on the floor near the doorway of a bedroom. Prosecutors presented crime scene photos of Berman, who was barefoot and wearing blue pajama bottoms and a white shirt, lying on her back with her arms outstretched. There was dried blood on her face and nearby, two of her dogs had left several bloody paw prints on the hardwood floors.
The officer said there were no signs of a burglary – no shattered windows, no overturned furniture and both a computer and purse were in plain sight. Sharif added that although Berman’s home is in the city of Los Angeles, many people mistake the area for Beverly Hills.
Prosecutors will likely argue at trial that Durst made that geographical mix-up. At an earlier hearing, Deputy District Attorney John Lewin displayed an envelope addressed to “Beverley Hills Police” which contained an anonymous note sent to authorities around the time of Berman’s death, alerting them to a “cadaver” inside her home. A longtime friend of the multimillionaire testified the handwriting looked like Durst’s.
During cross-examination, Durst’s lead attorney, Dick DeGuerin, seemed to suggest the crime scene may have been contaminated. When asked if he or any of the other officers inside the home were wearing protective gear – such as shoe covers – when they discovered the body, Sharif answered “no.”
Berman’s friend Daniel Goldberg testified Tuesday that during his last conversation with her, Berman said that she was expecting to see Durst during the holidays. She also told him Durst feared authorities would reinvestigate Kathie’s disappearance.
In a 2015 recording of a call with authorities, which was played in court, Goldberg recalled asking Berman what she thought happened to Kathie Durst. “She said, ‘You know, I’m a gangster’s daughter, so I have different standards for friends. ... But I think he probably, he – he – he – killed her,’” Goldberg said on the recording. But on the stand, he testified he now believed Berman was telling him that even if Durst had killed Kathleen, she’d still be his friend.
Another friend, Ricki Ring, testified that after Berman’s death, she made an anonymous call to police. “I just said, ‘Susan was not killed because of anything to do with the mob. Bob Durst killed her,’” Ring said, adding that she couldn’t recall if she spoke to an officer or left a voicemail.
Durst will return to court Thursday, as prosecutors gather testimony from conditional witnesses, who may be unavailable during the trial. The preliminary hearing will resume in October.
Source: Marisa Gerber, The Los Angeles Times, April 18, 2018.
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Post by pat on Apr 19, 2018 11:43:13 GMT -5
At the rate things are going, he'll be 80 years old before the trial ever starts.
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Post by Graveyardbride on Nov 22, 2018 3:56:24 GMT -5
Durst Enters Plea of ‘Not Guilty’ in Murder of Susan Berman
Robert Durst pled not guilty to the murder of his long-time friend, Susan Berman, 55, who was found dead in her Los Angeles home on Christmas Eve of 2000. Prosecutors theorize the eccentric millionaire killed Berman because she was about to be questioned by New York police in the reopened investigation of the 1982 disappearance of his first wife, Kathleen “Kathie” Durst, who has never been found.
The murder charge against Durst includes the special circumstance allegations of lying in wait and killing a witness to a crime, along with an allegation that he personally used a handgun to carry out the murder. The next hearing in the case is schedule for January 14, 2019. During the preliminary hearing that spanned several weeks, David Chesnoff, Durst’s attorney, said the prosecution’s theory that his client killed Berman while lying in wait was “very weak.” He also noted there were no fingerprints, DNA, blood, eyewitnesses or hair samples linking Durst to the crime.
However, Deputy District Attorney John Lewin argued Durst was “responsible” for his wife’s death in 1982 and labeled the defendant an “egomaniac” who has done what he wants his entire life. The prosecutor continued, saying Durst “got away with” his wife’s killing for years and even employed Berman to help cover his tracks – in part by having her pretend to be his wife in a telephone call to the dean of the New York medical school, where Kathie Durst was a student at the time of her disappearance. This is clearly a witness killing,” Lewin insisted, telling the judge there was evidence Durst killed Berman before she could speak to New York authorities about his wife’s disappearance. “He killed her because he was afraid she was going to talk,” the prosecutor alleged.
Durst has been behind bars since his arrest March 14, 2015, in a New Orleans hotel room. He was taken into custody hours before the airing of the final episode of HBO’s documentary series The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst, which examined the disappearance of his wife and the killings of Berman and a Texas neighbor, Morris Black, in 2001. Durst stood trial for Black’s death and dismemberment following a nationwide manhunt in which the fugitive was located in Pennsylvania. Durst, however, was able to convince the jury he killed his neighbor in self-defense.
In the finale of The Jinx, Durst is caught on a microphone muttering to himself, “Killed them all, of course,” and “There it is, you’re caught.”
At the end of the preliminary hearing in October, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Mark E. Windham labeled Durst’s comment in the documentary “cryptic” and described Berman’s murder as “an execution-style killing.” He also said the evidence suggested Durst killed his wife, supporting the argument that Berman’s death was an effort to eliminate a witness to a crime.
Durst has been long estranged from other family members and the Durst Organization, which owns a great deal New York City real estate and has an investment in the World Trade Center. He severed his relationship with the family when his younger brother, Douglas Durst, was placed in charge of the family business, leading to a drawn-out legal battle. According to various reports, Durst ultimately reached a settlement under which he received $60 to $65 million.
Sources: City News Service and KNBC, November 9, 2018.
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Post by madeline on Jan 13, 2019 23:28:47 GMT -5
Has his trial date been set yet?
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Post by Joanna on Jan 14, 2019 16:27:46 GMT -5
Durst Ordered to Stand Trial
The Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office has announced that New York real estate heir Robert Durst, 75, has been ordered to stand trial for the December 2000 murder of Susan Berman. Superior Court Judge Mark Windham issued the order on Thursday (October 25) after determining there is enough evidence to support the charges of murder with special circumstances. He also faces gun use allegations. Durst’s next court date is November 8.
Judge Windham found that statements by various witnesses who testified Berman admitted helping Durst by providing him an alibi in the case of his missing wife, Kathleen “Kathie” Durst, were admissible pursuant to the forfeiture by wrongdoing doctrine.
Berman served as Durst’s unofficial spokesperson following his wife’s disappearance. Over the years, she told friends Durst acknowledged killing his wife and she helped him cover his tracks. Prosecutors hope to use these hearsay statements at trial, which defense attorneys have vigorously challenged. Berman told one friend who testified at an earlier hearing that if anything happened to her, Durst would be the culprit.
Sources: Casey, Canyon News, October 30, 2018, and The Associated Press.
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Post by catherine on Jan 14, 2019 20:06:35 GMT -5
Durst is a crazy, amoral son-of-a-bitch, but I don't have any sympathy for Susan Berman. First, she helped him cover up a murder, which was wrong, though I have nothing against helping a friend. But, if you help a friend cover up a murder and you know he's a crazy, amoral SOB, you're even crazier if you try to blackmail him and that's what Berman did.
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Post by jason on Jan 14, 2019 21:24:39 GMT -5
Durst is a crazy, amoral son-of-a-bitch, but I don't have any sympathy for Susan Berman. First, she helped him cover up a murder, which was wrong, though I have nothing against helping a friend. But, if you help a friend cover up a murder and you know he's a crazy, amoral SOB, you're even crazier if you try to blackmail him and that's what Berman did. I agree. There isn't much worse than someone who turns on a friend and I don't have any sympathy for blackmailers.
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