Robert Durst Dies In Prison, Ending Westchester Murder Case

Jeff Edwards
Updated ·3 min read

WESTCHESTER COUNTY, NY — Former Lewisboro resident and convicted murderer Robert Durst has died in a California prison.

Durst died in a state prison hospital facility in Stockton, his attorney Chip Lewis told the AP. He said it was from natural causes due to a number of health issues. He was sentenced to life in prison Oct. 14. Two days later, he was hospitalized with COVID-19, his trial attorney Dick DeGuerin told the wire service.

The 78-year-old's death effectively ends any chance of prosecution by the Westchester District Attorney on charges that he murdered his wife Kathleen Durst.

“After 40 years spent seeking justice for her death, I know how upsetting this news must be for Kathleen Durst’s family,” DA Miriam Rocah said in a statement released Monday afternoon. “We had hoped to allow them the opportunity to see Mr. Durst finally face charges for Kathleen’s murder because we know that all families never stop wanting closure, justice and accountability.”

In light of Mr. Durst’s death, the DA said her offices plans to make further information surrounding this case available to the public, to the extent allowed by law, at a press conference "in the coming days."

Shortly after she took Office, as part of the newly formed Cold Case Bureau, District Attorney Rocah and the New York State Police reopened the investigation into the death of Robert Durst’s wife, Kathleen Durst. As a result, Robert Durst was charged for the 1982 murder of Kathleen Durst by indictment on November 1, 2021.

An earlier complaint charging Robert Durst with the murder of Kathleen Durst was filed in Lewisboro Town Court on Oct. 19. A state police investigator filed the initial criminal complaint,, according to the Associated Press.

The one-page felony complaint cites evidence in the files of the Westchester district attorney, the New York State Police and the Los Angeles district attorney, as well as “conversations with numerous witnesses and observations of defendants, recorded interviews and observations of Mr. Durst’s recorded interviews and court testimony in related proceedings," the Associated Press reported at the time.

Durst was sentenced in October to life in prison without parole for murdering a confidante who prosecutors say helped him cover up Kathie Durst’s killing. Los Angeles prosecutors say Durst shot Susan Berman in 2000 as she was preparing to confess her role to police.

Kathie McCormack Durst vanished on Jan. 31, 1982. The 29-year-old's body was never found. At the request of her family, she was declared legally dead in 2017. Robert Durst divorced Kathie Durst in 1990, citing abandonment.

Durst has maintained that his wife had left their lakeside cottage in South Salem and called him from their shared home in Manhattan.

After Berman’s death, Durst went into hiding, disguising himself as a mute woman living in a cheap apartment in Galveston, Texas. As an alias, he used the name of a former Scarsdale High School classmate. There, he killed a neighbor and chopped up his body, but was later acquitted after telling the jury he did it in self-defense.

Durst was taken into custody and has remained behind bars since March 14, 2015, when he arrested in a New Orleans hotel room hours before the airing of the final episode of the six-part HBO documentary series "The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst," which examined the disappearance of Kathie Durst and the deaths of Berman and the Galveston neighbor, Morris Black.

Robert Durst has long been estranged from his real estate-rich family, which is known for ownership of a series of New York City skyscrapers, including an investment in the World Trade Center. He split with the family when his younger brother was placed in charge of the family business, leading to a drawn-out legal battle and ultimately, a settlement was reached in which the family reportedly paid him $60 million to $65 million.

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Patch's Lanning Taliaferro and the Associated Press contributed to this report.



This article originally appeared on the Bedford-Katonah Patch