ROBERT DURST -- JINXED?

[Blindgreed1]

The story was running on GMA today when I left for work.

[username]

I read in the paper today that he has high level Asperger's. I believe that's coming from his defense team and I'm not sure to what degree, if any, it would benefit his defense. People with Asperger's can be very cold-hearted...exhibit similar traits as a socio-path.

I'll have to see if I can watch the documentary too.

[Duchess]

He appears to have a great deal of difficulty in relating to people and exhibits zero empathy.

[HairOfTheDog]

He appears to have a great deal of difficulty in relating to people and exhibits zero empathy.

I think Durst may have a personality or mental disorder. But, I also think he may just be a cunning actor.

If I didn't know he killed and dismembered a man and was suspected in two other deaths, I'd probably find him oddly likable from a distance.

If he does have a legitimate disorder (or a fake doctor-stamped one), I wonder if his attorney will use that as his defense. Personally, I don't think it would be a successful strategy because mental impairment requires the defense to prove that the accused didn't know what he was doing was wrong. If Durst killed Susan Berman, he premeditated it and covered his tracks coming and going. He lied about it for years. He outright denied doing it. He fled the scene. <-- He knew it was wrong; hard to get around that.

We know Durst killed and dismembered Morris Black and did all the same things (minus premeditation and plus dismemberment), but he successfully used a self-defense ploy, not an impairment defense. I don't think Durst has a shot in hell of getting off using self-defense in the murder of Susan Berman (but, if anybody could pull if off again, it would be his lawyer Dick DeGuerin).

Anyway, when Durst was acquitted of the murder of Morris Black, he was convicted of evidence tampering and bond jumping felonies. He spent a couple of years in a Texas jail.

As a convicted felon, he's therefore prevented from owning a weapon. Today he was charged in a New Orleans court for illegal possession of a firearm and drugs. He had a .38 caliber and some marijuana in his room when he was arrested on an out of state warrant for the murder of Susan Berman Saturday night.


^71-year-old Bobby doesn't look too broken up to be going before a New Orleans judge today. He will be extradited to Los Angeles when New Orleans is finished with him.

I don't know what makes Durst do what he does, but I do believe watching his mother jump from the roof to her death when he 7 must have helped shape who he became. And still, he knew what he was doing, he knew it was wrong, and IMO he probably liked doing it.

[ramseycat]

On GMA this morning they said he was transferred to the psych ward where he will remain until his bail hearing next week.

[HairOfTheDog]

On GMA this morning they said he was transferred to the psych ward where he will remain until his bail hearing next week.

The Sheriff in New Orleans placed him there saying that Durst is a suicide risk. Durst's attorney says that's absolutely not true. Wonder what's going on behind the scenes with law enforcement.

The latest:
Real estate heir Robert Durst was in possession of a fake ID, nearly $43,000 in cash and a latex mask that could cover someone's head and neck when he was arrested at a New Orleans hotel on Saturday, a search warrant affidavit says.

According to the affidavit made public Wednesday, the FBI learned Durst had been withdrawing large sums of money since October. The affidavit also says Durst was found to be in possession of a fake Texas ID card under the name "Everette Ward" when he was arrested. Authorities say they were concerned Durst had the financial means to flee the country.

The affidavit was for a search of his condominium in Houston, which was executed Tuesday. Authorities seized a cellphone, bank statements, credit cards, compact discs and various court documents from the residence.

Durst could face the death penalty if convicted of killing Berman, the daughter of a prominent Las Vegas mobster, under special circumstances that allege he ambushed her and murdered a witness to a crime.

A law enforcement official said his arrest in connection with Berman's death was based on a letter Durst wrote to Berman a year before her killing and similarities it had to one that pointed police to her body. That evidence, which was uncovered and made public in the HBO documentary, revived the cold case.

The search warrant affidavit referenced above indicates a forensic document examiner confirmed for Los Angeles police in November that the letter that had alerted authorities to Berman's body was written by Durst.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/affidavit-re...-arrested/

[username]

It baffles me that the letter that was sent to police wasn't immediately compared to his handwriting samples (or at least I haven't heard that it was). Granted the similarities between the two letters is even more damning (the consistent misspellings) but a hand written letter? You'd think a hand writing expert could tell based on ANY writing samples from Durst whether they likely came from the same person.

[HairOfTheDog]

^ Yeah, the filmmakers did what LAPD should have done in the Susan Berman murder investigation. I agree.

I don't know if police would have had enough probable cause to secure a search warrant for docs written by him, but it's hard to believe they wouldn't have been able to get a hold of any publicly accessible forms or docs containing the handwriting of a Durst family member.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if Durst made a hand-written statement for NYPD when he reported his wife Kathie missing and LAPD never even asked to check it out. NYPD's handling of the missing person case was a complete joke too -- they did virtually nothing; Kathy's friends' amateur sleuthing was much more productive. And Texas LE in the Morris Black murder case dropped the ball in many ways as well. Crappy police work, all the way around, IMO.

Anyway, Durst is being looked at as a possible POI or suspect in the disappearances of two teen girls in our neck of the woods as well, user.

MISSING NORTHERN CALIFORNIA TEENS, LINKED TO DURST?


^ 18-year-old Kristen Modafferi (left) and 16-year-old Karen Marie Mitchell (right) were last seen in different Northern California towns in 1997.

It's unclear how seriously the authorities are looking at Durst in those cases, but Durst's apparent connection to them is intriguing.

Modafferi disappeared on June 23, 1997 after leaving work for the day at a coffee shop in a San Francisco mall. Durst owned a home in the city at the time. A 2003 Galveston County Daily News article reports that an investigative journalist who wrote a book about the disappearance of Durst's wife Kathleen believed Durst knew something about Modafferi.

Mitchell was last seen on Nov. 25, 1997 leaving her job in Eureka. Witnesses said she left in a blue sedan driven by a 60-70-year-old man with light gray or sandy blonde hair (Durst would have been much younger then, but witnesses often screw up age estimates and Durst liked to alter his appearance). A friend of Durst said Durst drove that kind of sedan back then and that he lived near and may have even visited Mitchell's place of business.


^ Robert Durst (left); witness sketch of Karen Mitchell suspect (right)

[HairOfTheDog]

THE DEFENSE OF ROBERT DURST; HERE WE GO AGAIN...

When Durst fled New York City back in 2001, disguised as a mute woman named Dorothy Ciner, he ended up hiding out in a shit hole in Galveston, Texas. A couple of months later, he killed and dismembered his Galveston neighbor Morris Black.

During his trial, Durst claimed self-defense and vilified the victim; the Defense team used the "he had it coming defense".

In addition, Durst and his attorneys blamed Jeanine Pirro, the NYC District Attorney who'd just re-opened the investigation into the disappearance of Kathie Durst.


^ Jeanine Pirro, according to Robert Durst and team, was an ambitious woman (the horror) and was out to get Robert Durst in order to further her own career. Essentially, the Defense claimed, if she hadn't re-opened the missing person case which pushed Durst into running from New York City, Durst wouldn't have been in Galveston and Morris Black wouldn't be dead.

As crazy as it sounds, the jury bought it and felt sympathy for Durst, as if he was the victim (jurors were interviewed in the HBO series and said as much).


^ Dick DeGuerin is Durst's criminal defense attorney -- he's one of the best attorneys in the country, hands down. Since Durst's arrest last weekend for the murder of Susan Berman, DeGuerin has been busy laying the foundation for Durst's defense in the media.

This time out, DeGuerin contends that Durst is the victim of filmmaker Andrew Jarecki (even though Durst, against DeGeurin's advice, asked Jarecki to make the documentary, not the other way around). DeGuerin also claims that Durst has mild Asperger's and that there was a conspiracy between HBO, Jarecki and LAPD to set up Robert Durst.

DeGuerin is dismissing all the allegations against Durst as false, saying Robert Durst is an easy target. "There's no evidence. There's no linkage. Maybe the next thing we'll hear is he's responsible for the death of Jimmy Hoffa," DeGuerin said.

Hey, Dick, maybe the fact that your client's wife (declared "dead" years ago), your client's best friend, and your client's neighbor have all been murdered makes him a legitimate target of suspicion. Add to that the fact that your client admits on film to lying and not telling the whole truth in regards to his involvement in those cases, the incriminating hand-writing evidence against your client, and your client's confession-like utterance and it's kinda hard to sell the "witch hunt!!" jive this time around (I HOPE).

Durst is still in custody on weapons and gun charges in Louisiana and receiving some kind of medical treatment there. That gives LAPD time to build their case against Durst for the murder of Susan Berman before Durst is extradited to California. That rubs DeGuerin the wrong way. That's just too bad.


^Deborah Lee Charatan is Durst's very weird wife. It's being reported that authorities are trying to get Charatan — who married the billionaire murder defendant less than two weeks before Berman’s execution-style slaying — to take a deal and testify against her husband in exchange for immunity. Authorities believe that she was helping him with a plan to flee to Cuba when he was arrested in New Orleans. If charged and convicted with "aiding and abetting a plot to flee prosecution", she could spend five years in jail.

[HairOfTheDog]

^ The confession-like utterances of Robert Durst in the bathroom after being confronted with incriminating evidence against him, along with background information.

[HairOfTheDog]

THE LATEST IN THE SAGA


Bond Denied in New Orleans: ^Robert Durst was in court yesterday -- he was denied bond, which is a surprise to nobody. He'd jumped bond in Galveston prior to his trial for the murder of Morris Black and is expert at going off the grid. Plus, his family is worth billions and he alone is worth of $100 million.

The New Orleans Charges and Evidence:
Durst is being charged with illegal weapons possession and drug possession. His attorney Dick DeGuerin is arguing that those charges should be dropped because the police did not have a search warrant when they went through his New Orleans hotel room and found the .38 caliber, the 5 ounces of marijuana, all the cash, the passport, the fake ID, and the mask that is meant to conceal someone's identity by making them appear very elderly.


It seems DeGuerin ^ is right about the timing of the search warrant (from what I can tell). However, if Durst allowed the officers in to look around, it doesn't matter (unless Durst claims he didn't and a judge believes him). Durst is the kinda guy who would invite officers right on in, in my opinion. He likes the game.

[Duchess]

Sure he likes the game AND I believe he thinks he's smarter than everyone else.

[HairOfTheDog]

Connecting the Dots between Los Angeles and New Orleans LE - 2015
Here's what I think is going down -- it's just my speculation:

Durst was getting ready to go to Cuba to evade charges for the murder of Susan Berman in Los Angeles. He didn't know what was gonna be shown on the last segment of The Jinx the next night, but he knew he'd been busted on his handwriting matching Berman's killer's handwriting.

LE was trying to keep tabs on Durst, but he's an evasive fucker. Finally, he messed up and called to check voice mail on one of his phones and LE was able to track his location. They swarmed him in New Orleans before he could skip.

LAPD would like to get some more evidence in order or confirmed before Durst is arraigned in Los Angeles, so they want him to stay in New Orleans' custody on the weapons and gun charges for a while. New Orleans PD put him on psych hold because, well, he's psycho and they can keep him longer. His attorney DeGuerin wants Durst released and extradited to L.A. as soon as possible.

Durst will be back in New Orleans court on April 7^th. I hope LAPD has got its shit together this time -- DeGuerin wants a probable cause hearing. He's already jumping out in front of the incriminating evidence in the media.

P.s. Durst and DeGuerin tried to get Jeanine Pirro tossed from the court room in New Orleans yesterday. The judge declined and Pirro just smiled away.

[HairOfTheDog]

Connecting the Dots between NYC and L.A. and Galveston - 2000/2001

A Texas PI (Bobbi Bacha) who has investigated Robert Durst on behalf of LE for years is convinced that Durst didn't just happen to end up in Galveston, Texas in 2001.

It turns out that Morris Black (the crotchety old man Durst claims he first met there and then killed and dismembered in self-defense) and his brother worked on a farm project around the time that Durst's wife Kathie went missing. Who did the brothers work for? A company owned by Robert and Douglas Durst, the PI alleges.

So, there's speculation that Morris Black had information about Kathie Durst's disappearance and when Jeanine Pirro reopened that investigation in 2000, Durst went to work on his hit list. Susan Berman knew a lot -- she'd served as Durst's media spokesperson in regards to Kathie's case and was his closest confidante. She was also in dire financial straits at the time. She got hit first.

Next came Morris Black (his brother had already died). Sadly, there isn't anything tangible to personally connect Durst to Black prior to Galveston and no one left alive to interrogate about it, but I have no trouble believing this theory over what the Defense sold to the jury in Galveston.

Bacha believes there are many yet unknown victims of Robert Durst (and Morris Black).

Source: http://crimefeed.com/2015/03/dont-know-r...-theories/

[HairOfTheDog]

Vermont Connection?

Today, Vermont LE confirmed that Robert Durst is a POI in the 1971 disappearance of 18-year-old Lynne Schulze. Authorities there say they have long been aware of a connection between Lynne and Robert Durst. They are not revealing the details.


^ Lynne was a student at Middlebury College when she vanished after leaving her friends to go back to her room and grab a pencil for an exam.

Robert Durst owned and operated the All Good Things health food store in Middlebury at the time.

Story: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/vermont-poli...ppearance/

[HairOfTheDog]

This dude is so very bizarre.

Turns out, according to an interview he did shortly after his arrest in March 2015, Durst told prosecutors he was high on meth the whole time he was filming The Jinx. I believe him. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/robe...04470917e0

I also believe he straight up murdered his wife, his roommate, and his best friend Susan Berman.

Anyway, Durst is still awaiting trial in the death of Susan Berman and has already pleaded guilty to a federal gun charge that could get him 7 years.

[HairOfTheDog]

Haha! That people of WalMart pic a few posts up used to be a link to pic of Durst. I'm leaving it.