Just ahead of Robert Durst’s long-anticipated murder trial, attorneys for the real estate scion confirmed that he wrote an anonymous note to police 20 years ago.
A Christmas Eve filing made by Durst’s attorneys confirmed that he penned a letter in 2000, leading authorities to recover the body of his friend and crime writer Susan Berman, CNN reported. The new evidence emerges a month before Durst is expected to stand trial in her killing.
“This does not change the fact that Bob Durst did not kill Susan Berman and he does not know who did,” his lawyer maintained.
Berman had been scheduled to speak with authorities about the 1982 disappearance of Durst’s first wife, Kathleen McCormack Durst, whose body has never been found. Statements made by Berman about creating an alibi for Durst were ruled inadmissible by the court in 2018. Durst was arrested in 2015 in New Orleans and has pleaded not guilty.
In “Jinx,” a 2015 documentary on HBO, Durst said the note could only have been sent by Berman’s killer, Near the end of the documentary, Durst was heard muttering into a live microphone that “he killed them all.” Durst later claimed he had been on methamphetamine.
Kathleen’s sister, Carol Bamonte filed a separate wrongful death suit last year alleging that the Durst Organization conspired to protect the firm from any connection to Kathleen’s death. The suit alleges Kathleen was killed because she sought to expose illegal business the Durst Organization had engaged in — prompting Seymour Durst to direct his son Robert to “take care of this problem.” [CNN] — Georgia Kromrei