Judge Acquits Robert Durst In Trespassing Case
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- Real estate heir and confessed killer Robert Durst was acquitted Thursday of trespassing outside the homes of his relatives in Manhattan.
In a bench trial that started Wednesday, Judge Ann Scherzer found Durst, 74, not guilty. She reviewed videotapes that show Durst strolling past the brownstones on West 43rd Street owned by his brother Douglas and standing near the planters outside a Durst-owned skyscraper in Midtown with a film crew making a documentary about his stranger-than-fiction life, WCBS 880's Irene Cornell reported.
Scherzer also vacated the order of protection that covered 13 members of the prominent real estate family.
"I'm ecstatic," Durst said of the verdict. "I don't jump up and down, but I'm ecstatic."
Relatives say they fear Durst, who was suspected but never charged in the disappearance of his wife in 1982.
He later went on the lam to Texas, dressing as a woman and pretending to be mute. He confessed to killing and dismembering his elderly neighbor in 2001, but he convinced a jury he killed the man in self-defense and was convicted on lesser charges.
Last month, HBO announced it will run a six-part documentary about Durst. "The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst" premieres in February.
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