Robert Durst, a wealthy and whimsical American septuagenarian made famous by an HBO documentary devoted to him, was convicted on Friday of the murder of his best friend by a court in Los Angeles.
The 78-year-old multimillionaire, who pleaded not guilty, was accused of killing his friend Susan Berman with a bullet to the head at the latter’s home in 2000 in Beverly Hills.
Did he cover up the murder of his wife?
The prosecution believes that Susan Berman, 55 at the time of the murder, helped Robert cover up his role in the murder of his wife Kathleen and that Mr Durst ended up killing Ms Berman to prevent him from responding to the police New Yorkers who were investigating his wife’s disappearance in 1982.
Black sheep of one of the biggest families of New York real estate, Robert Durst was arrested in March 2015 on the eve of the broadcast of the last episode of a six-part biographical documentary, broadcast by the HBO channel. Entitled “The Jinx”, the series had revived the interest of the general public in this affair and Robert Durst appeared there himself.
Accused of having killed and dismembered his neighbor
“The Jinx” looked back on another bloody episode in Robert Durst’s life: the murder of a neighbor, Morris Black, whom he then dismembered and thrown into the sea in an attempt to make the body disappear.
The sulphurous millionaire had at the time taken refuge in Texas, where he lived disguised as a woman and claimed to be silent, in a small sordid apartment.
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“What did I do? I killed them all, obviously”
He had been acquitted of the crime by an army of prestigious lawyers who had pleaded a mixture of self-defense, accidental shooting and acts of alcohol.
In “The Jinx”, Mr. Durst seemed to make an involuntary confession, whispering to himself as he was in the bathroom and his wireless mic was not turned off: “What did I have? did? I killed them all, obviously. “
During an interview with prosecutors after his arrest, Mr. Durst defended himself by claiming that he was under the influence of drugs during the filming of the documentary and that these words therefore meant nothing in particular.
During the trial, prosecutor John Lewin, however, assured the jury that a “mountain of evidence” weighed on Durst, responsible according to him for three deaths, all linked to each other.
“He’s a triple murderer”
“He has never been held responsible for the violence against (his wife) Kathie. He has never had to answer for her death. For the past twenty years, he has gotten away with murdering Susan,” as did for that of his neighbor Morris Black, he said.
“He is a triple murderer who has managed to escape all responsibility so far,” lamented the prosecutor at the bar.
The famous “reasonable doubt”
“Bob did not kill Kathie Durst, so there was no secret” to protect in the case of Susan Berman, pleaded for his part a lawyer for the millionaire, David Chesnoff. “They haven’t proven that he killed Susan Berman beyond a reasonable doubt,” he insisted.
Robert Durst, placed in solitary confinement after having been in contact with a Covid-19 patient, was not present in the court when the verdict was read.
His trial opened after a long procedure in March 2020 in Los Angeles. But the hearing had to be suspended only two days later due to the coronavirus pandemic. He had resumed after a 14-month suspension.
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