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Post by steve on Jan 15, 2019 17:15:45 GMT -5
I agree. There isn't much worse than someone who turns on a friend and I don't have any sympathy for blackmailers. So which do you think is worse, someone who helps cover up a murder, or someone who blackmails a friend?
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Post by madeline on Jan 16, 2019 15:10:12 GMT -5
So which do you think is worse, someone who helps cover up a murder, or someone who blackmails a friend? Someone who blackmails a friend.
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Post by Graveyardbride on Jan 21, 2019 15:22:30 GMT -5
Durst Trial Scheduled to Begin September 3, 2019
Four years after his arrest for killing his best friend, Robert Durst, the idiosyncratic son of a New York real estate tycoon, finally has a trial date. During a hearing in Los Angeles on Tuesday, January 15, Superior Court Judge Mark E. Windham scheduled the trial for September 3, 2019.
“September 3rd is fine for trial,” Durst responded in his slow, creaking voice.
However, in a setback for the defense team, the judge also ruled the DA may present evidence in the trial relating to the 2001 killing of Morris Black, Durst’s neighbor in Galveston, Texas, – Durst was acquitted of Black’s murder.
Prosecutors contend the 75-year-old multimillionaire shot Susan Berman in the back of the head in her Benedict Canyon home in December 2000 to prevent her telling authorities what she knew about the 1982 disappearance of Durst’s first wife, Kathleen “Kathie” MacCormack Durst. A key prosecution claim is that Durst killed his wife, whose body has never been found. The Defendant has publicly denied involvement in Mrs. Durst’s disappearance and pled not guilty in the Los Angeles case.
His defense attorneys argue the murder charge stemmed from publicity surrounding the HBO series, The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst, not from evidence. Durst was arrested in connection with Berman’s slaying March 14, 2015, and the following night, the six-part series finale aired, the episode in which Durst mutters, “Killed them all, of course,” during a bathroom break. Many viewers considered the comment mumbled into a hot microphone his confession to killing three people: Berman, his wife and his onetime Texas neighbor.
Durst fled to Galveston, a city of approximately 50,000 on the eastern Texas coast, in the fall of 2000, days after articles concerning the reopening of an investigation into Kathie Durst’s disappearance began appearing in New York newspapers, prosecutors alleged. He rented a $300-per-month apartment and disguised himself as an elderly, mute woman. Prosecutors have argued only one person in Galveston – Morris Black – knew Durst’s true identity.
Durst’s legal team sparred with prosecutors during the hearing over what, if any, evidence from the Texas case should be presented to jurors in Los Angeles. Chip Lewis, who also represented Durst during his 2003 trial for Black’s murder, argued that bringing up old evidence would not only strip his client of a fair trial, but also undermine the decision of 12 Texas jurors. “What the people are attempting to do here is to, in fact, prosecute Mr. Durst for the exact same crime,” Lewis asserted. “The Constitution requires we respect returned verdicts of our sister states.” His team expressed particular concern over the possibility of prosecutors showing jurors photographs of Black’s dismembered body parts, which were recovered from plastic bags floating in Galveston Bay. The images are “unduly gruesome” and could “overcome the jury’s rationality,” attorneys claimed in a pleading.
Source: Marisa Gerber, The Los Angeles Times, January 15, 2019.
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Post by kitty on Jan 21, 2019 17:37:06 GMT -5
Finally!
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Post by steve on Jan 22, 2019 14:29:13 GMT -5
Durst is a good example of nature over nurture. He's from a very wealthy family, they all had good educations and opportunities and while the brothers are both very successful multi-millionaires, he's a serial killer. If he had any sisters, I'm sure they're also rich and successful.
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Post by Graveyardbride on Mar 12, 2019 7:22:02 GMT -5
Former Judge Accuses Durst of Leaving Severed Cat Head on PropertySusan Criss (above), the former Galveston County judge who presided over Robert Durst’s trial in 2003, is certain it was Durst who left a severed cat head on her property. Because she is now in private practice, Criss is free to talk about the multifaceted case.
Twelve years after being acquitted of the murder of Morris Black, whom he claimed he killed in self-defense, Durst was arrested in March 2015 just hours before the airing of HBO’s documentary The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst. The documentary examined the disappearance of his wife and the killings of Berman and Black and created a sensation after Durst was heard during the finale muttering to himself on a live microphone: “You’re caught! What the hell did I do? Killed them all, of course.”
According to Criss, it was in 2006 that she allegedly encountered the cat head near her driveway. “It was the sidewalk that leads from my door to the curb,” she recalled. “What was left, as close as you can possibly be to my property without touching my property, was a severed cat head with the front legs. It was in perfect, pristine condition. Not a drop of blood. No bodily fluid. Just clean. And the front legs were crossed. I ran into my house to make sure my dogs were okay. They were fine. But I just thought severed head, cut pristine – he was just the prime suspect.” She said she immediately thought of the crime scene photos from Durst’s trial, which she admitted were terrifying.
In 2001, a 13-year-old boy fishing in Galveston Bay encountered his own grisly find – a human torso. Police divers later found the arms and legs in garbage bags. The body parts belonged to Black, who was 71 at the time of his death. Durst was living in Galveston under an assumed identity as a mute woman in a $300-per-month apartment. While he pled not guilty to murder, the trial revealed that after killing Black, Durst chopped up the remains. “I saw how clean-cut the body parts wore,” Criss continued. “They were not jagged. He cut them up with such surgical precision. It did not look like a first-time job. It was startling and frightening to see that.”
Durst’s defense team presented an elaborate argument of self-defense. “Morris Black died as a result of a life-and-death violent struggle over a gun that Morris Black had threatened Bob Durst with,” Houston attorney Richard DeGuerin told the jury. “As they struggled, the gun went off and shot Morris Black in the face.” Mike Ramsey, another defense attorney on Durst’s team, claimed Durst was then “thrown into a traumatized state, similar to an out-of-body experience, caused by a previously undiagnosed psychological disorder.”
And while prosecutors attempted to depict Durst as a methodical killer who spent two days cutting up Black’s body on his kitchen floor before dumping the parts into Galveston Bay, Durst claimed he downed a fifth of Jack Daniels and didn’t remember dismembering his former friend.
Initially, Criss admitted she thought Durst was insane, but soon changed her mind. “During the jury selection in the trial, he was acting crazy in court,” she said. “He was making animal sounds at the table. It was just bizarre. Talking to imaginary people who weren’t there. He brought a lot of attention to himself. There’s also the question of what kind of person would chop up another human being?” she continued. “A lot of people would think you have to be crazy to do that. Because you just can’t relate to something that heinous.” Then, when Durst learned there may have been tape-recorded phone conversations from jail where he may have made some incriminating statements, he “dropped the act,” she added.
But, she said, Durst’s team did whatever they could to humanize the mogul from the murderer. “His behavior showed that he was working hard to make himself look human at the trial,” said claimed. “I think he did that so we could get over the fact that he committed such a heinous crime by cutting the body up. And I think every strategy is to humanize the defendant. He’s a small man to begin with, but they dressed him in oversized clothing to make him look smaller. And they lowered his seat to accentuate that. His legal team also called him Bob. You know, they did what they had to do to show the other side of the person, not just the person who committed the crime.”
The image Durst’s team created was that of a troubled millionaire suffering from mild autism who panicked after accidentally shooting the older man. The New York Times reported that on the witness stand, Durst said he fled New York for Galveston because he learned the Westchester County district attorney had reopened the investigation into the disappearance of his wife, Kathleen “Kathie” McCormack Durst. Her body has never been found and she is presumed dead.
Following four days of deliberation, the jury announced at a news conference after the verdict was read that while there were holes in Durst’s story, the prosecution ultimately failed to prove he deliberately murdered Black. “There’s no question that he killed [Black],” Criss asserted. “It was not self-defense, as he put it. I think a big part of it was that they were able to pick the jury that they wanted … And they were looking for who they could sell their story to.”
But Durst’s saga is far from over. On September 3, he goes on trial in Los Angeles Superior Court for the murder of Susan Berman.
Durst denied any involvement in his wife’s disappearance, but allegedly told Berman he had killed her. When New York authorities reopened the case in 2000 and planned to speak with Berman, prosecutors contend Durst ambushed his long-time friend and shot her in the back of the head. Prosecutors added that Morris Black, who eventually figured out Durst’s identity, was allegedly killed to prevent his revealing the millionaire’s whereabouts.
“This is a never-ending story,” Criss concluded. “It’s a story of a wealthy person with so much privilege who could end up locked up. ... But there was a lot of rejection in his life. And I think he couldn’t handle being told no. He just doesn’t want to be told no.”Sources: Stephanie Nolasco, Fox News, January 21, 2019, and The Associated Press.
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Post by madeline on Mar 12, 2019 20:04:57 GMT -5
I think she's jumping to conclusions. If he wanted to freak her out, he would have killed her dogs. She says "I ran into my house to make sure my dogs were okay," which means she's a dog nutter and most dog nutters don't care anything about cats.
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Post by Graveyardbride on Mar 23, 2019 4:45:58 GMT -5
Lawsuit Charges Durst ‘Crime Family’ Covered Up Kathie Durst’s Murder
Robert Durst killed his first wife and then his wealthy father and other members of his “crime family” helped cover it up, according to a scathing Manhattan lawsuit filed by Carol Bamonte, sister of Durst’s first wife, Kathleen “Kathie” MacCormack Durst.
Before she disappeared in 1982, Kathie had planned to expose illegal business dealings within the family’s real estate company, the wrongful death suit alleges. Her threats, the complaint continues, prompted Durst’s magnate father, Seymour Durst, to warn his son that his wife “was a threat to the family’s business and directed Durst to take care of this problem.” It is further claimed that in the months and years following Kathie’s disappearance, Seymour circled the wagons in order to protect his son. The patriarch, other relatives and people linked to the Durst Organization “conspired to protect [Robert] Durst and The Durst Organization from any connection to Kathie’s disappearance and murder” making them “accessories after the fact,” Bamonte charges in her suit filed Friday (March 22) in Manhattan Superior Court.
“The crime family members” helped develop “a false alibi” for Durst, telling a series of lies to the media and police to prevent their suspecting Robert, the complaint alleges. The family’s involvement in creating this “false narrative” is “further evidence of [Robert] Durst’s guilt,” it states. Seymour, who has since died, “ordered” his family and employees “not to cooperate with the police investigation,” and they spread “a publicity smear campaign against Kathie and her family.” Seymour knew “that Durst lied about his and Kathie’s whereabouts on January 31, 1982, and knew or had to know that Durst killed Kathie – but he still publicly and privately referred to Kathie as a ‘runaway wife.’” Robert Durst remains the only suspect in Kathie Durst’s death. The lawsuit seeks unspecified cash damages.
“The accusations are fiction, and this is a lawyer’s attempt to make a buck,” Durst family spokesman Jordan Barowitz declares in response. “Unfortunately, Robert’s mendacity has left a trail of heartbreak, grief and broken lives.”
Robert Durst is currently charged with killing his friend, Susan Berman, in December 2000 to prevent her revealing his role in his wife’s disappearance, and the trial is set to begin September 3, 2019.
Source: Prescilla DeGregory, The New York Post, March 22, 2019.
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Post by pat on Mar 23, 2019 17:14:16 GMT -5
I thought his family paid him off to get out of the family business and go away.
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Post by Graveyardbride on Jul 18, 2019 17:18:19 GMT -5
Judge Will Allow Handwriting Experts to Testify Regarding ‘Cadaver’ Note
Judge Mark E. Windham will allow handwriting experts to testify in the trial of Robert Durst for the murder of Susan Berman. The subject of such testimony is the anonymous note received by Beverly Hills police advising of a “cadaver” at 1527 Benedict Canyon Drive. The mysterious missive, written in block letters, was postmarked the day before Berman’s body was discovered at her home. She had been shot in the back of the head. The letter was a key piece of evidence that ultimately led investigators to suspect Durst.
Prosecutors contend Durst killed his long-time friend to prevent her reporting what she knew about the 1982 disappearance of Kathy Durst, the eccentric millionaire’s wife.
Windham will allow the state to call at least two experts, both of whom have concluded Durst was likely the author of the note. However, the judge decided to exclude the analysis of William Leaver, a Los Angeles Police Department expert who came to conflicting conclusions in his analysis. The testimony of Nye Brenner, Leaver’s supervisor, who admitted she rubber-stamped the initial report without reading it, is also excluded. “At this point with the limited (exemplars) on Durst, there are more similarities w/Brenner. Need more,” Leaver wrote at the time. Windham labeled Leaver’s conclusion “garbage” and said “it’s truly shocking” that the supervisor signed off on his report without a thorough review.
It was Leaver’s disjointed analysis that defense attorneys cited when they sought to block handwriting analysis, calling it “junk science.” Following the hearing, the attorneys declined to comment on whether Durst was the author of the note.
The two experts, whom prosecutors plan to call during the trial, reviewed the case with far more writing samples than those available to Leaver, and neither knew about Leaver’s analyses or errors and both pointed the finger at Durst, prosecutors claim.
Sources: PressFrom, July 18, 2019; Alene Tchekmedyian, The Los Angeles Times, July 17, 2019; and State of California v. Robert Allen Durst.
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Post by Graveyardbride on Sept 5, 2019 20:35:47 GMT -5
Durst Team Loses Motion to Have The Jinx Producers Declared ‘Government Agents’
Superior Court Judge Mark E. Windham rejected an attempt by Robert Durst’s defense attorneys to have the producers of the Emmy-winning documentary, The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst, declared “government agents.” It is believed the defense wanted the filmmakers declared as such in order to force the release of material gathered during production of the six-part HBO series.
In addition to the murder of Susan Berman, the subject of the instant case, The Jinx also included the 1982 disappearance of Kathleen “Kathie” McCormack, Durst’s first wife, and the killing and dismemberment of Morris Black, Durst’s Galveston neighbor, in 2001. At the end of the final episode, Durst is heard muttering to himself on an accidentally open microphone that he had “killed them all, of course.”
The filmmakers, Andrew Jarecki, Marc Smerling and Zac Stuart-Pontier, began developing The Jinx in early 2011 and by August, they were speaking with Los Angeles police and prosecutors. In its motion, Durst’s defense team, led by Dick DeBuerin of Houston, argued the filmmakers and the police “consulted, coordinated and collaborated” so closely that they formed a “symbiotic relationship,” converting the filmmakers into government agents. The producers not only allowed police and prosecutors to view multiple advance screenings, they even put together a PowerPoint presentation – at the suggestion of prosecutors – concerning why Durst should be charged with Berman’s murder.
Windham initially said he did not have the authority to “declare” the filmmakers government agents absent the context of a specific discovery dispute. However, he relented after Lewin and the filmmakers’ attorney, Victor Kovner of New York, argued that a decision now would save time at a later date. Windham then said he could rule by treating the defense motion and Kovner’s response as early discovery motions.
The motion was just one of several the Durst team lost during the daylong hearing, including a motion to remove prosecutor John Lewin from the case because he was deeply involved in a years-long investigation and could be called as a witness.
Durst’s trial was set to begin this month, however, in May, the it was postponed and is now scheduled to begin January 13, 2020.
Jim McCormack, Kathie Durst’s brother, expressed disappoint the trial had been delayed once again. “I’m just hoping he’s still alive. Our family has been through hell,” McCormack said. “I have the utmost confidence in the district attorney and his team, but I feel like a steam kettle that’s been firing on a stove more than 30 years. She was my baby sister. I want closure and justice. Closure will be a jury saying he’s guilty.”
Durst has battled esophageal cancer and a buildup of fluid in his brain in recent years and has undergone spinal fusion surgery.
Sources: Don Debenedictis, Courthouse News Service, September 4, 2019; Christian de La Chapelle, Fox Business News, September 3, 2019; and Nancy Dillon, The New York Daily News, May 17, 2019.
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Post by kitty on Sept 6, 2019 19:44:44 GMT -5
I'm beginning to think that old bastard won't ever be tried. I've lost count of how many times his trial has been postponed.
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Post by Graveyardbride on Jan 1, 2020 12:24:25 GMT -5
Durst Admits Writing ‘Cadaver’ NoteRobert Durst has admitted writing a cryptic note that police have long believed was penned by the person who shot and killed Susan Berman inside her Benedict Canyon home almost two decades ago. The so-called “cadaver note” – an anonymous letter sent to Beverly Hills police containing the address 1527 Benedict Canyon Drive, and the word “cadaver” – has been considered a critical piece of evidence in Durst’s pending murder trial. The note, written in block letters, was mailed December 23, 2000.
Defense lawyers have repeatedly attempted to block testimony from forensic document examiners who say the handwriting on the note matches Durst’s. The judge also rejected attempts by the defense to identify Berman’s personal manager as both the author of the note and the killer. Then, in a document filed on Christmas Eve, the attorneys suddenly reversed course, acknowledging their client wrote the note.
This is the first time that either Durst or his legal team have conceded he was in Berman’s home, or even in Los Angeles, around the time someone placed a 9-millimeter handgun to the back of her head and fired, killing her instantly. However, both Durst and his lawyers continue to deny the now 77-year-old millionaire was involved in the murder. “Bob didn’t kill Susan Berman and he doesn’t know who did,” Dick DeGuerin, the lead defense attorney, said in an interview.
Durst has been in jail since 2015, when he was arrested in New Orleans and charged with Berman’s murder just hours before the final episode of The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst aired on HBO. Authorities suspected he was about to flee the country.
The upcoming trial, set to begin in February, could last as long as five months and is expected to refocus the media spotlight on the long, complicated story of Robert Durst, once considered the heir apparent to a vast New York real estate empire. Already, NBC’s Dateline, ABC’s 20/20 and CNN Headline News are planning to air episodes on the wily millionaire, who is known to have killed one man – Morris Black – and, in addition to the murder of Susan Berman, is suspected of killing his first wife, Kathie Durst.
Los Angeles police discovered Berman’s body in December 2000 after neighbors reported her back door was ajar and her dogs were out. There was no sign of forced entry, nothing had been taken and no fingerprints or DNA were located at the scene.
Prosecutors contend Durst killed Berman because he feared she was about to tell the authorities what she knew about the 1982 disappearance of his wife, who vanished five months before she would have finished medical school.
Friends said Berman was fiercely loyal to Durst and had acted as his spokesperson and media advisor. Prosecutors and witnesses allege she also made a critical telephone call, posing as Kathie Durst, prompting New York police detectives to reconsider their original suspicions and hobbled the investigation.
The cadaver note that arrived at the Beverly Hills police department became a key piece of evidence in Berman’s death. After clearing various suspects, in 2002, investigators obtained a court order for Durst’s handwriting samples to compare to the block lettering on the note. By then, Durst was in jail in Galveston, Texas, charged with the killing and dismemberment of Morris Black, a man who had lived across the hall from him. The two men became friendly after Durst left New York in 2000, when the authorities reopened the investigation into his wife’s disappearance.
Durst took the stand in his 2003 trial and claimed that while he and Black were struggling over Durst’s gun, it fell to the floor and went off accidentally. He told the jury he dismembered the body because he thought no one would believe it was self-defense – he was acquitted.
With the murder investigations in Los Angeles and New York stalled, Durst could have laid low, but instead, in 2010, he decided to talk to journalists and filmmakers, giving producers of The Jinx access to his private papers, urging friends to talk to them and submitting to in excess of 20 hours of filmed interviews.
The producers discovered new evidence, including a 1999 letter from Durst to Berman and on the envelope, he had misspelled “Beverly,” spelling it Beverley. He addressed the cadaver note to the Beverley Hills Police Department. When he was confronted about the misspelling by The Jinx filmmakers, Durst still denied writing the note.
Although his lawyers now acknowledge such denial wasn’t true, in a legal brief filed in August, there is an indication they will argue the note could have been written by someone other than Berman’s killer. “What the note demonstrates is that the person who mailed it was aware that there was a body at the house, not that the individual murdered Susan Berman,” the brief states.
In 2015 and 2016 interviews with The New York Times, one of Durst’s friends, who requested anonymity out of fear of legal entanglements in the case, said Durst privately acknowledged finding Berman’s lifeless body when he went to her home on December 23 and wrote the note because he was afraid her dogs would gnaw on her corpse. He fled after mailing the note because he feared the police would think he was the killer.
Durst, however, told prosecutors, filmmakers and Howard Altman, his godson, a different story. According to Altman, while Durst was in jail in Galveston, he said, “The person who wrote the note killed her.”
When questioned about the inconsistencies in his client’s statements, DeGuerin replied, “He said a lot of things that I don’t think are correct.”
Jury selection in Durst’s trial is expected to begin February 10. Sources: James Queally, The Los Angeles Times, December 31, 1999, and Charles V. Bagli, The New York Times, January 1, 2020.
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Post by Graveyardbride on Feb 11, 2020 13:12:19 GMT -5
Jury Will Hear Durst ‘Coerced’ Wife to Have Abortion
The trial of Robert Durst began Tuesday, February 11, and last month, the eccentric millionaire lost a major legal battle. Judge Mark E. Windham ruled jurors will be allowed to hear evidence the defendant “coerced” Kathie Durst, his first wife, into having an abortion before her disappearance in 1982. “This is relevant to show motive in the disappearance of Kathie Durst and motive in the homicide of Susan Berman,” the judge said.
“As Kathie began to gain independence and neared graduation, defendant began to lose some of this control. He responded with emotional abuse and increasing violence,” prosecutors alleged in their motion. “The fact that defendant controlled Kathie by forcing her to get an abortion, coupled with the fact that his mental and physical abuse escalated as he began losing control, tends to prove defendant’s motive to kill Kathie, as well as his resulting actions after her death,” the state argued.
According to prosecutors, Durst killed Kathie McCormick Durst, Susan Berman assisted with the coverup and the defendant killed Berman to prevent her telling what she knew. “The subsequent cover-up that defendant orchestrated with Susan Berman’s assistance became defendant’s motive for eventually killing Susan as well,” they wrote.
Wearing a white shirt, light blue suit and white athletic shoes, Durst appeared frail, but alert, at the hearing, swiveling in his chair to face Deputy District Attorney John Lewin at one point.
The defense had an expert witness, Dr. Milton Altschuler, waiting to testify concerning their client’s mental health, but following a meeting in chambers, the witness was not called to the stand. Altschuler diagnosed the real estate heir as having Asperger’s Syndrome prior to Durst’s murder trial in Galveston, Texas, which ended in acquittal. After the hearing, Dick DeGuerin, a member of the defense team, declined to comment on the doctor’s status.
Durst, now 76, has pled not guilty to the execution-style murder of Susan Berman, his longtime friend, in December 2000.
Sources: Stacy Lambe, ETonline, February 10, 2020, and Nancy Dillon, The New York Daily News, January 13, 2020.
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Post by JoannaL on Feb 28, 2020 17:37:28 GMT -5
Jury Seated in Durst Trial
The jury – eight women and four men – was seated yesterday (February 27) and attorneys will return Monday to select 12 alternate jurors for the trial that is expected to last as long as five months.
Seventy-six-year-old Robert Durst has been behind bars for five years, since his arrest on March 15, 2015, in a New Orleans hotel.
Los Angeles prosecutors intend to show Durst killed his longtime friend, Susan Berman, because, according to Deputy DA John Lewin, he was “afraid she was going to talk.” It is believed Berman assisted Durst following the 1982 disappearance of his first wife, Kathleen “Kathie” MacCormack Durst, in New York. Many think Berman impersonated Kathie Durst in a phone call and likely knew the location of the body.
Defense attorney David Chesnoff denies Lewin’s allegations, insisting there are no fingerprints, DNA, blood, hair samples or eyewitnesses linking his client to the crime.
A key piece of evidence in the case is expected to be what is called the “cadaver note,” which Durst finally admitted writing.
Durst has been long estranged from his family in New York, having broken ties with his relatives when his younger brother was placed in charge of the Durst Organization, the family’s commercial and residential real estate company. Reportedly, Durst ultimately reached a settlement in which he was paid between $60 and $65 million for his interest in the company.
Sources: Matt Hamilton, The Los Angeles Times, February 27, 2020, and Court TV.
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