Real Estate Heir Robert Durst Pleads Not Guilty In Friend's Murder
LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Real estate heir Robert Durst pleaded not guilty Monday to a murder charge stemming from the death of his friend in Benedict Canyon nearly 16 years ago.
Durst has been charged with capital murder in the death of Susan Berman, who was killed just before Christmas Eve in 2000, according to the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office.
The 73-year-old Durst proclaimed his innocence in court, saying "I did not kill Susan Berman."
Prosecutors say they will not be seeking the death penalty for Durst. He's expected back in court Feb. 15.
COMPLETE COVERAGE: Robert Durst Murder Trial
The murder charge includes the special circumstance allegations of murder of a witness and murder while lying in wait, along with gun use allegations.
Authorities suspect Durst killed Berman because prosecutors in New York's Westchester County were about to interview her about the 1982 disappearance of his first wife, Kathleen "Kathie" McCormack Durst, who was in the process of divorcing him.
According to court papers, Los Angeles police detectives claim two handwriting experts have linked Durst to an anonymous letter alerting authorities to a "cadaver" at Berman's home.
He was arrested on March 14, 2015, in a New Orleans hotel room just hours before the airing of the final episode of HBO's "The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst."
In the series finale, Durst was caught on microphone saying to himself, "Killed them all, of course," "There it is, you're caught," and "What a disaster."
He had checked into the hotel under the alias Everette Ward. Agents located a loaded Smith and Wesson .38-caliber revolver, a "realistic mask" and more than $40,000 in cash, according tot he U.S. Attorney's Office.
In 2003, he went on trial for killing and dismembering Morris Black, a man who lived across from him in Galveston, Texas, where Durst fled while authorities were trying to make a case against him in the killings of Kathie and Berman. However, he was acquitted by a jury that deemed Black's killing was an act of self-defense.
He was sentenced in April 2015 in Louisiana to seven years in federal prison on a weapons charge.
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