posted on November 11, 2003 02:16:42 PM new
This guy murdered his 71 year old neighbor, cut up his body so that it would fit into a garbage bag and then dumped him into Galveston Bay.
Robert A. Durst, the millionaire real estate heir from New York who was living like a drifter in Texas, was acquitted today of charges that he murdered a 71-year-old neighbor in Galveston two years ago.
Mr. Durst, 60, admitted killing Morris Black in September 2001, butchering him, putting his body parts in garbage bags and dumping them into Galveston Bay. But he steadfastly maintained that the death was the result of a struggle and not murder.
When the state jury returned the not guilty verdict today in a courtroom scene televised live nationally, Mr. Durst looked stunned, his mouth agape, and then he looked upward as if in relief.
He hugged his lawyers and their assistants and then said, "Thank you so much." None of his relatives or friends appeared to be in the courtroom.
Conviction could have brought Mr. Durst a prison sentence of 5 to 99 years and a fine of up to $10,000.
Prosecutors contended that Mr. Durst had plotted the murder to assume Mr. Black's identity. At the time, Mr. Durst was avoiding New York investigators who wanted to question him in connection with the disappearance of his wife, Kathleen A. Durst, 21 years ago.
Defense lawyers argued that Mr. Durst had been drinking at the time of Mr. Black's killing and either shot his neighbor accidentally or in self-defense after he discovered Mr. Black in his apartment and they struggled over a gun. Mr. Durst's lawyers said his dismemberment and disposal of the body was prompted by an alcohol-induced panic.
The brother of Kathleen Durst, James McCormack, said that he was shocked by the verdict today. "How can 12 people who heard and saw the evidence agree that he was not guilty?" Mr. McCormack said in a telephone interview from New Jersey. He said he and his family would continue to cooperate with the authorities investigating the disappearance of his sister.
Two friends of Mr. Durst, Stewart and Emily Altman, who attended some of the trial proceedings, said they were relieved by the verdict. "We're very happy for Bob," Mr. Altman said from Long Island. "The jury did the right thing." His wife said, "There is no evidence that Bob did anything wrong."
During the six-week trial, the Texas prosecutors and Mr. Durst's lawyers, some of the most highly paid and powerful in the state, painted a picture of the two men as an odd couple who both lived on the fringes of Galveston in a Victorian boarding house.
Mr. Durst told jurors that he came to Galveston disguised as a mute woman in November 2000, donning a wig and a dress, to escape media attention in New York after the investigation into his first wife's 1982 disappearance was reopened.
He said that he became friends with Mr. Black after dropping the masquerade, but that the friendship had soured because of Mr. Black's aggressive behavior.
Mr. Durst's lawyers sought to portray Mr. Black as cantankerous and potentially violent. At one point in the trial, the defense put a former social worker on the stand who testified that Mr. Black once told her that he had killed a United States soldier in Japan because the soldier had killed Mr. Black's wife. There was also testimony that Mr. Black had been expelled from a Galveston public library because he was making threats, and that he had made threats against a utility worker.
Mr. Durst testified that on Sept. 28, 2001, Mr. Black had broken into his apartment, had found Mr. Durst's pistol and had pointed it at him with an angry look in his eye. He said the two struggled with the weapon but that he does not remember most of what happened. Rejecting the prosecution's contention's that he had killed Mr. Black deliberately, Mr. Durst said on the stand: "I did not kill my best friend. I did dismember him."
Mr. Durst said that after he shot Mr. Black, he panicked and decided to cut up the body with two saws and an axe, dispose of it and then leave Galveston. He said he did not think anyone would believe that the shooting was not premeditated.
Garbage bags containing most of Mr. Black's body parts were found in shallow water two days after the shooting. The head has never been found.
One of Mr. Durst's lawyers, Dick DeGuerin, offered jurors a sympathetic portrayal of his client, saying Mr. Durst has struggled with a mild form of autism and severe addiction all his life, factors that he said had contributed to his panicked decision to get rid of the body. "You don't need psychiatrists to explain to you what panic is," he said.
The prosecutor Joel Bennett scoffed at that notion.
"You can't cut somebody up — another human — and bag him up and dump him in the bay when you act in self-defense," he said.
After Mr. Black's death, Mr. Durst fled to New Orleans but returned to the island city of Galveston, where he was arrested. He posted bond but then fled, becoming a fugitive for six weeks before his recapture in Pennsylvania after, the police said, he tried to steal a $5 sandwich and some bandages, even though $38,000 in cash was found in the trunk of his car.
Mr. Durst's first wife, Kathleen, disappeared in 1982. During the trial in Galveston, Mr. Durst's lawyers said that Mr. Durst fled New York for Galveston in November 2000 to escape public scrutiny from a new investigation into her disappearance by the Westchester district attorney, Jeanine F. Pirro. Mr. Durst said during his trial that he feared that Ms. Pirro was trying to further her career at his expense.
One of Mr. Durst's lawyers went as far as to imply during closing arguments on Friday that Ms. Pirro was to blame for Mr. Durst's predicament in Texas.
"If Ms. Pirro had kept her mouth shut, none of this would have happened," said Mike Ramsey. "If she had a case, she could've filed it two and a half years ago."
Mr. Durst also faces legal problems in a third state. Investigators in Los Angeles want to question him in the killing of a former spokeswoman for Mr. Durst, Susan Berman, who was found shot in the back of the head on Dec. 24, 2001. Ms. Berman's body was discovered shortly before she was to have been questioned by investigators about Mr. Durst, for whom she worked when his wife disappeared.
The Durst family runs the Durst Organization, a privately held billion-dollar New York company that became a major landowner in Times Square in the 1960's.
Charles V. Bagli, in Galveston, contributed reporting for this article, which was written by Maria Newman in New York.
posted on November 11, 2003 02:46:24 PM new
Durst admitted killing Black. He was charged with MURDER. The defense requested he be judged only on guilt or innocence on MURDER. The prosecution FAILED TO PROVE his guilt on the MURDER charge.
In Texas murder is defined as:
(1) intentionally or knowingly causes the death of an individual;
(2) intends to cause serious bodily injury and commits an act clearly dangerous to human life that causes the death of an individual; or
(3) commits or attempts to commit a felony, other than manslaughter, and in the course of and in furtherance of the commission or attempt, or in immediate flight from the commission or attempt, he commits or attempts to commit an act clearly dangerous to human life that causes the death of an individual.
Durst claimed self defense, the jury believed him & the lack of evidence worked against the prosecution.
Durst still has to face charges of jumping bail & possibly, improper disposal of a body.
Had he been charged with manslaughter or a charge less than murder, he would probably have been found guilty.
"Another plague upon the land, as devastating as the locusts God loosed on the Egyptians, is "Political Correctness.'" --Charlton Heston
posted on November 11, 2003 03:17:02 PM new
He is guilty as sin and a complete loon . I really believe that when people find and act beyond their personal comprehension that they toss out the possibility of its reality because it intrudes too much on their comfort level. Easier to say that this didn't happened or was justified than to believe that it is truly possible. This guy is suspected not only i his wifes murder but in the disappearance of another female friend who was supposed to be meeting with the police about his wifes disappearance.
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If it's really "common" sense, why do so few people actually have it?
posted on November 11, 2003 03:27:04 PM newThis guy is suspected not only i his wifes murder but in the disappearance of another female friend who was supposed to be meeting with the police about his wifes disappearance.
Suspicion does not equate to guilt.
A jury of his peers judged him to be NOT GUILTY of Murder.
So your belief he is guilty doesn't mean anything.
The prosecution FAILED in its part to provide "beyond reasonable doubt"as to his guilt.
As I stated before, he may have been guilty of manslaughter, but he wasn't charged with manslaugher.
"Another plague upon the land, as devastating as the locusts God loosed on the Egyptians, is "Political Correctness.'" --Charlton Heston
