01x03 - The Gangster's Daughter

[bunniefuu]

She had everything to live for,

and yet she just disappeared.

Now new and alarming questions
are being raised

about what happened to a young
wife and medical student

here in New York
some 20 years ago.

Two decades later,
Kathie Durst is suddenly

more than a memory,
thanks to a tip

from a defendant
in an unrelated case.

I had arrested an individual
named Timothy Martin.

And Timmy was arrested for

several counts
of public lewdness.

He was basically
exposing himself to women.

He was convicted,
and shortly before sentencing,

his attorney contacted me
and stated that

Timmy wanted to
sit down with me and talk to me

about some information
he had on an old m*rder

that occurred up here
in Northern Westchester.

_

What he stated was that
he had heard that there was

a young woman named Kathie Durst
who was m*rder*d by her husband

at their cottage
up in South Salem.

I remember that day the little,
red light

was flashing on my
answering machine,

and I hit the button
and it was Joe Becerra.

And he said,
"We're looking into the Kathie Durst case."

My heart almost stopped.

expl*si*n.
This whole set of fireworks that went out

that was like hope
has been regenerated.

We were, like, stunned.

I mean, you know,
it's, you know, it's,

don't forget it's almost


And all of a sudden,
Kathie's disappearance

may be close at hand
in terms of a solution.

These two guys
pulled up in a car,

and they came onto the property
and said they were detectives

and could they come in and look
at something in the house

and ask me a couple questions.

They looked into a closet,
and they took a shelf down

and they started pulling things
out and dug back to an area that

I didn't even know
existed in my house.

I guess they were looking for
a w*apon or, you know,

bloodstains or something.

No one had ever
searched the house.

No one had ever attempted
to search the house,

search the lake,
search anywhere else.

I mean, it was very telling
that there was a whole area

that needed to be investigated.

That this case
was not investigated

the way it should have been.

No one even looked at it.

You know,
starting at square one.


Is Robert Durst a suspect?

We're not ruling him in
and we're not ruling him out.

He certainly was
a person who had

the most information
about Kathleen Durst.

_

So, you hear
about this investigation.

You read the article.

And it blew me away.

Absolutely,
totally blew me away.

I'd never heard the name
Jeanine Pirro before.

And I was told
about Jeanine Pirro.

Has higher aspirations.

Wants to run for
something big statewide.

I wasn't the least bit concerned
about the details.

The divers searched the lake
until you're blue in the face.

You took a wall out of the house.
Ridiculous.

What were the divers for?

Obviously,
they were looking for body parts,

looking for something that
can be used as evidence.

But what they don't announce
is what they found.

_

Uh, nothing
of evidentiary value.

I remember being disappointed,
uh, you know,

that nothing came up
in the search.

But it also piqued my interest.

Because I knew,
based upon whether it was

the inconsistent statements or,
you know,

the prosecutors, or the cops,

that there was
something more here.

My name's Ed Murphy.
I'm a senior investigator

with the Westchester
District Attorney's Office.

I've been in law enforcement
approximately 40 years.

Now with the case
being reopened,

and it's being looked at again,

certain things come
to the surface.

And the decision was made
by my office

to explore this
and see what we can do.

So, we went back
and we reinterviewed

everybody who was interviewed


When I started
speaking with Kathie's friends,

they all said to me that
I should speak to Susan Berman.

That she was a very close
friend of Bobby's.

That they were close
since college.

That when Kathie went missing,

she protected Bobby
from the press.

And they basically told me
if anyone knows anything

about Kathie's disappearance,
it would be Susan Berman.

_

_

_

Susan and I would spend
a lot of time together,

we could talk,
we had the thing in common,

both of her parents d*ed
when she was young,

and I had one parent die
when I was young.

And her background?

Rich, Las Vegas,
mobster father.

_

This happy,
little girl was 5 years old

when this snapshot was taken.

Her mother had been
a tap dancer,

but gave it up when she married.

Her father was rich and powerful
and doted on his only child.

That little girl today
is Susan Berman.

And she's the author of
Easy Street.

You grew up to age of 21

not knowing that
your dad was a gangster.

How'd you finally find out?

A friend at UCLA,
Jane, asked me

if I'd seen
a certain crime book

that just came out.

And I said, "No."

And I ran to the store
in Los Angeles and looked,

and there was my father,
described as

an ex-con from Sing Sing

who'd k*ll a man with
one hand behind his back.

He was tied in
with the so-called

"m*rder Incorporated."

After all, he was a bank robber

at one time, you know.

So...

She was quite proud of him.

And he was bigger than life.

So, yes, she does,
yes, she deified him.

She even had his mug sh*t framed
in the living room.

Something happened
when she met Bobby Durst.

It was like "Here's a man
as powerful as my father.

"He is connected.

"He has money.

"He can always get
out of trouble.

And he needs me."

And she always used to say,
"He needs me."

"We have a special friendship."


Robert Durst told police

he had driven his wife
from their country house

in South Salem, New York,
to this nearby train station,

where she boarded
the city-bound train,

headed for their
Manhattan apartment

and a busy week
at medical school.

But no one close to Kathie
would see her again.

"The beautiful wife
of a wealthy Manhattan

real estate developer
has disappeared."

_

"There has been no trace of
sandy-haired Kathleen Durst, 29,

"since January 31,
when she returned to her penthouse

"after a weekend in the country.

"The doorman at


"saw her arrive home
that Sunday evening

and go to her apartment."

This would not be information
gleaned from the police.

We wouldn't give that out.

It's being fed
to the newspaper at that time

from the Durst side.

When Kathie disappeared,
I saw the media was calling.

I told Susan, "I got a call from
this reporter and this reporter.

Could you call them back
and you just handle it?"

Since she was a writer,

she was used to dealing
with the press.

Susan took it upon herself
to become his spokesperson.

She was facilitating a
story that established the fact

that Kathie arrived
in Manhattan alive.

Bob and Susan were in
a concerted campaign

to plant these ideas out there,

and already people are starting
to pick up on them.

So, it becomes that much
more difficult

to find out what
really happened.

If you reconstruct
the case of Kathie,

there were several people
who saw Kathie

when we know she was dead.

And she was heard from
Monday morning.

Mrs. Durst was a fourth year
medical student

here at the Albert Einstein
College of Medicine,

and she was to have
a clinic class that morning,

but she called up saying
she wasn't feeling well

and she wouldn't be in that day.

And as far as police know,
that's the last time

that anyone
had contact with her.

The dean at the medical school,

obviously somebody was, um,

assisted Mr. Durst
in calling him.

_

Well, sitting here today,
it's, it,

my, my money would be
that it was Susan Berman.

In our minds,
Kathie made it to Manhattan.

So, with luck and a little bit of...
cunning,

it slipped through.

He got that one past us,
I guess.

I think we all know now,


that anything Bob says
you have to question, you know.

I don't think they
thought that way then.

You want to talk
about the guts of our case?

The guts of our case is that

Kathie Durst and Bob Durst
were married.

The marriage spun
out of control.

Became increasingly volatile.

We found out she
asked him for a divorce.

Got a divorce attorney.

That prior Thursday
before she went missing,

Kathie's attorney
told her that Bob Durst

had turned down their request
for an agreement on a divorce.

So, 3 days prior to this,
you know,

Bob's turning down
this settlement

that she wants in this divorce,

and they're going
up there together.

At the time
of her disappearance,

they were together in the
upstate house in South Salem.

And there is no evidence,
credible evidence,

that she ever left South Salem.

I don't know
how he k*lled her, but

I don't think she ever got on a train,
that's for sure.

Did you have anything to do

with the death of your wife?

I don't know that she's dead.

Do you think that it's
possible that she's alive now?

It's possible.
Not likely.

It's not what I think.

I think she's almost
definitely dead.

But I don't know
that she's dead.

So, to put a finer point on it,

did you have anything to do

with the disappearance
of your wife?

No.
I don't know where she is.

I don't know
what happened to her.

I don't know how
it happened to her.

I had nothing to do
with what happened to her,

except very, um,
obliquely or whatever you would...

It was a bad marriage
and that was at least half,

probably a lot more, my fault.

But other than that,
I had nothing to do with

what caused her
or what happened

to her disappearance,
in her disappearance.

When he gives his
original statement to the police,

he leaves the car at home.

Doesn't bring it into the city.

Doesn't have the car the day

he reports her missing,
you know?

Maybe he was afraid
to have the car there,

because they might want
to search it or look at it.

He probably took Kathie,
put her in the trunk of the car,

and got rid of her somewhere.

We did some phone record
sweeping, and we found that

some of the phone records show
that the Durst Organization

got collect phone calls
from Ship Bottom, New Jersey,

on Tuesday,
after Kathie's disappearance.

We were able to track down
where those calls came from.

And there was a coin-operated
phone in the laundromat.

Now, how do we know that
Bob Durst made those calls?

Well, one of the things we know
is that there are only

two people who made collect
calls to the Durst Organization.

We know that from
the people who worked there.

And one of those people
was Bob Durst.

The other person was Seymour.

So, Seymour undoubtedly wasn't
in Ship Bottom that day.

You used to
call the office collect.

Oh, all the time.

- Tell me about that.
- I would call the office collect.

Why did you do that?

I didn't want to pay for it.
Let Seymour pay for it.

The only reason I'm calling
is because he wants me to call.

There were a series
of collect calls

made from Ship Bottom,
New Jersey.

That's on the coast somewhere.

- Yeah.
- So, there are 3 calls made

to the Durst Organization
from Ship Bottom.

Now, you were
the collect call guy,

so, I think the speculation is

"Well, Bob must have
made those phone calls."

Except Bob didn't
make those calls.

Bob was not in Ship Bottom.

Can you think of any reason why

these phone calls,
these collect calls,

would be made to
the Durst Organization

during the day?

I have no idea
who made the calls.

Were there other people
that you knew of

that would make collect
calls to the company?

Several. Yes.

Yes.

Executives?
Or family members?

Somebody had a,
had a beach house

and was calling and,
and getting

one of the receptionists...
Not the usual receptionist...

To accept the calls.

That had happened periodically

that spring and summer
and fall.

Make no mistake,
we went digging looking for a body.

I mean, you know,
we know that he was in New Jersey

within a couple of days
of her disappearance.

_

Do you have any thought
about where she is?

About where her body might be?

I have no idea.

Wouldn't know how to begin.

Wouldn't know if her body...
If she was dead... I would not know

if her body would be
in the State of New York,

or in the State of New Jersey

or in the Northern Hemisphere,
or anything like that.

If you go to Ship Bottom

and the area surrounding
the Pine Barrens,

you see ample, ample real estate

where he could have
dumped the body.

It's actually a place
where mob bosses

used to order that
bodies be dumped.

And what connection is that?
Well, Susan Berman,

who was very friendly
with Bob at the time,

had a lot of connections

and a lot of friends
in organized crime.

I would say
that Susan would do anything

to help her close friends.

No matter the situation.
Mm-hmm.

She was... She was loyal.

I think she was a loyal soul
to the end.

What was your
relationship with Susan Berman

over all those years?

When Kathie disappeared,

initially the first
several years,

Susan was living,
still living in New York.

And I saw her frequently
in New York.

Then she moved to Los Angeles.

I went online
and I traced Susan Berman

from Beekman Place
all the way out

to Benedict Canyon
in California.

I gave the police
a map to her door.

And I said, "Whatever you do,
interview this woman.

"She knows more than
she's saying.

"She's a good friend of Bob's.

Maybe she won't tell you anything,
but maybe she will."

We had a conversation
in which I said, "Susan,

"did you see the piece
in the New York Times

about Kathie Durst's
case being reopened?"

And she said,
"Julie, don't talk to me about that.

"I don't want
to talk about that.

They're out to get Bobby."

That's what she said.

Did you have contact
with Susan around that same time?

Yes.

What did she say,
if you remember?

- She wrote, "Oh, Bobby.
- This is terrible for you.

I hate that you have
to go through this."

But you heard from her
that she had been

contacted by the police?

- Yes.
- What did she say?

"The Los Angeles Police
contacted me.

They want to talk to me about
Kathie Durst's disappearance."

Something happens
to Susan then.

Oh, not long after that,
Susan Berman was m*rder*d.

Around Christmas of 2000.

_

_

_

Yeah, I was going
to Europe for,

like, 3-ish weeks
for the holiday.

And my, I had no parking
in my neighborhood,

so, I parked my car
in the garage,

and Susan kept her car here.

And we hung out
and sort of exchanged

gifts and cards
and well wishes,

and then the taxi came and,
you know, we said, "I love you,"

and I got in the taxi and left.

_

I met her at 13.

She, uh,
had started dating my father.

We moved in with her, uh,

I want to say, like,
a year into their dating.

Because of how light,
happy, joyous, quick,

brilliant, aware she was,

daily life was
fascinating and fun.

She laughs a lot.
She laughed a lot.

And, um, you know,
frivolously spent a lot.

And everything could be
turned into a story.

She came alive
for those few years

that she became their mother.

It was, it was just,
it was wonderful to see.

When the relationship of their
father's was breaking up,

both of these kids,
willingly and together,

made the declaration
that they are choosing

to live with their mother Susan.

When I called and she didn't
pick up Christmas Eve,

obviously I didn't know what,
but something was wrong.

Well, I called because

she was late for dinner
by a half-hour,

and she was always very,
very punctual

when it came to
little family dos.

I said,
"Susie. It's Deni.

"Um, I hope you didn't confuse
tonight with tomorrow night.

"I've got Koo Koo Roo.
We're waiting for you.

"Tommy's hungry.
Mom's hungry.

Where are you?"

So, then the phone did pick up.
It was a man's voice.

I said, "Who's this?"

He said, "Detective..."

I didn't even hear his name.
I heard the word "detective"

from the L.A.
Police Department.

"On December 24, 2000,

"West Los Angeles patrol officers
responded to a radio call...

Open door at 1527
Benedict Canyon Drive."

"The officers,
upon arriving at the scene,

"observed the rear door
standing open,

and entered the residence."

"The officers discovered
the victim's body

"supine on the floor
of a bedroom

located in the southwest
portion of the residence."

"The victim had sustained
a g*nsh*t wound to the head.

Paramedic pronounced death
at 13:48 hours."

The first thing I remember was
the condition of the house.

Uh, it was, uh, pretty barren.

I think all the furniture
that was in there

was things that people
had loaned her.

There was no carpeting
on the concrete floors.

There was no heat
in the residence.

And there's no
drawers overturned.

Nothing had spilled out.

Everything is intact.
The computer is there.

The front door was
secured with deadbolt locks.

There was no evidence of
any kind of forced entry.

Which meant to me,
or indicated to me,

that whoever k*lled her
had probably

been let in by Susan Berman.

_

I'm in an office
waiting to interview someone.

And I look at The Daily News,

and there's this tiny,
little story out of L.A.

that Susan Berman was
found sh*t dead in L.A.

And I almost
fell out of my chair.

I just sat straight up
and I wanted to leave.

_

That was probably
the only time in this case

that really,
really took my breath away.

I was standing up
when I answered the phone.

I felt my knees get weak.

Because I, it was like,
I told them, "Go out there."

_

When I heard
that Susan had been m*rder*d,

the first person I thought of
was Robert Durst.

Because we were about
to speak with her.

_

Susan Berman
wasn't just k*lled.

I mean, it was execution.

Her death is a very
questionable death,

not just in terms of the fact
that it was a homicide,

but the timing is
extremely curious.

_

How did you react when
you heard about Susan's m*rder?

I felt terrible for Susan.

I was astonished that they were

putting all this together
that I did it

or I caused it to be done.

Did you have anything to do
with Susan Berman's death?

I had nothing to do
with Susan Berman's death.

Did you have
any theory yourself

of what might have
happened to Susan?

No.

Does it make sense
to you that there were

people that suspected
you of having...?

Oh, sure.
I mean, because

she was my spokesman.

All of a sudden, she's dead

right after Jeanine Pirro's
doing the investigation of me.

Mm-hmm.

That I shut her up.

She wrote about mobsters,

and she was
the daughter of one.

So, when author Susan Berman

was found dead of a single
g*nsh*t wound to the head

at her Benedict Canyon home
on Christmas Eve,

all of the obvious
questions came up.

Mostly
"Was it a mob-style hit?"

_

We were surprised
to learn that Robert Durst

was not a suspect
in Susan Berman's m*rder.

The LAPD was looking at mob
connections of that m*rder.

Susan Berman's
business manager said that

she had been working on
television projects

about the mob's days in Las Vegas
when she was k*lled.

She did talk to me about
something she was working on

that I think was not
a screenplay.

I think it was
a journalism story.

And I think that
it involved the mob.

"Something big."

She was going to blow the socks
off of something.

"Something big was
going to happen."

And I said, "Well, what?"

"Well,
I can't talk about it now,

but something big is
going to happen."

I was suspicious right away.

Back of the head.

That's traditional
in mob killings.

The Beverly Hills
Police Department received

a letter in the mail.

The envelope was addressed
"Beverly Hills Police."

Beverly is spelled wrong,

spelled with LEY
instead of just LY.

And the note read,
"1527 Benedict Canyon,"

and the word "Cadaver."

The letter was
postmarked the day before

the discovery of
the victim's body.

That letter says a lot.

It gets mailed to
a police department,

so that somebody would
come and find her body

so it's not sitting there,
decomposing, rotting away.

I mean, it's somebody that
obviously cares about her.

So, we eliminated the mafia
being a possible suspect.

So, what do you
think about this?

About this note?

I mean, does this note
mean anything to you?

Yeah, I mean,
that's her address.

Block letters so somebody
was hiding their signature.

And they spelled
"Beverly" wrong.

Can you think of a reason

why somebody might
write a note like that?

I can't imagine.

Can't imagine.

One of the speculations is that

if it was somebody
that liked her,

they wouldn't want her
lying around in her house.

You know, if she had to die,
she shouldn't die...

If somebody liked her,
why k*ll her?

And now you're taking
this big risk.

Which big risk?

You're writing
a note to the police

that only the k*ller
could have written.

One of the things
that we confiscated

was Susan's
computer hard drive.

And we found a ledger,

of names of people
that had sent her money.

She was reaching out to past

business associates
or friends for money.

She started
having money problems.

She was months behind in rent.

_

You know,
she's going to get through this.

She has deals that, uh,
were looking good with, you know,

different projects
there in Hollywood.

Susan wrote
a lot of screenplays.

She had a lot of meetings.

And she had so much
faith in herself.

She really did.

Um, but none of the screenplays
ever got bought.

Being a woman,

being an older woman
in this young industry

just was hard
and getting harder.

She was in desperate straits.

So, Susan in desperate straits

was very different than
the Susan that I knew.

People do things that...
Their relationships change.

Susan could manipulate,
for sure.

She was a good manipulator

and could manipulate
for things that she wanted.

_

There was indications
that she had received

a couple checks
from Bobby Durst.

Susan was tough.

And it, you know,
it probably would not have scared her to...

I'm not saying
"thr*aten blackmail,"

but to suggest,
"I can really use..."

You know?
"And wouldn't it do us both some..."

I could see it.

Was there anything that
Susan knew as your confidante

that you would have been uncomfortable
with her telling the police?

Well, we had lots
of private things,

but none of it had
anything to do with Kathie.

I mean, when Kathie was,
you know, going bananas,

we would talk about Kathie
all the time.

I couldn't imagine her talking
to the police about that,

just sitting here right now.

But "If the police
want to talk to me,

"I'm just going to
talk to them.

Is that all right?"
And, like, that was the conversation.

"Do whatever you want."

My name is Sareb Kaufman.

Um, Susan Berman was my mother.

There's just one request
that I would like to make,

which is that we keep
the best in mind,

and try not to dwell too much
on the sadness of these events.

People were
flying in for the memorial,

and it was expected Bobby
was going to be there.

I believe he was
in L.A. at the time,

but he didn't come
to the funeral...

To the memorial service.

_

Yes. He called me.

I found the call
a little bit threatening,

to tell you the truth.

Um, he said...

I, I don't recall
what he really said.

You know, I don't recall what he gave
as the reason for the call.

It could have been
something like

"Just checking in with you."

Never interested in me
for one second.

Bobby called.
And why wouldn't he call?

He was her best friend...
Or one of her best friends.

And we commiserated with that.

_

"My God, isn't this awful?"

_

Maybe he did,
now that you're saying that.

He was trying to,
to make allies in Susan's camp.

For what reason, I'm not sure.

Maybe, you know,
to keep us from

talking to the cops,
which we already had.

I, I have no idea.

But he definitely was
trying to, to, um,

find out where
he could find allies.

_

It was shortly after.
Um, I, I forget if

he called me or I called him.

I mean, there...
It was a point where I was kind of

going through her Rolodex
and just letting people know.

This was kind of again, like,
I was calling the reporters,

I was calling,
you know, the police.

He was obviously very
sympathetic and, you know,

sad to hear about it,
and asked what he could do.

And then it was
around that time

that people were starting
to talk about him as a suspect.

But it never made sense to me.

Not for even a second.

I knew how Susan
felt about him.

Sareb and Bobby
became very close

right after Susan d*ed.

Which was a problem, because

the rest of us... You know,

felt that we were living
in different realities.

When people try to explain to me
the predominant theory as to,

"Hey, his wife went missing,
and, you know,

plenty of people
think he k*lled her"

and "Hey, look,
they just opened up this case

"just, you know, a month before,

two months before,
isn't that curious?"

And "Hey, there's no such thing
as coincidence."

Um, it... I first say,
"Of course there is coincidence.

There's always coincidence."

Yes, he is a part of the list,

because he would have
been allowed in.

He, you know, she would have
turned her back on him,

you know.

But, uh, nothing else make,
makes sense to me on that.

I can see how a young person,

who had just lost
his mother figure

and he was
starting out in life,

would like to believe
in a multimillionaire

who could be his good friend.

_

Well, no, it wasn't...
I mean, well,

he had, well,
he basically in a conversation

that we had had at some point,

again it came up,
I hadn't gone to college.

He asked me,
"How much would it cost for you to go?"

And so I, you know, I told him,
"About $200,000."

It was a little padded,
admittedly, but not by much.

I mean, it was tuition, living,
being able to focus.

He said, "I'll give you
$25,000 a year for 4 years."

_

_

On his next trip around,

Bob said he wanted
to have dinner.

_

We did not.

We did not have that dinner.

_

Because apparently
shortly thereafter,

he was on the run for the, uh...
Well,

at the time it was arrested for

m*rder and dismemberment
of a body.

So, he missed the dinner.

Galveston Police are convinced


k*lled and dismembered

his 71-year-old-neighbor
Morris Black,

then threw his body parts
into Galveston Bay.

I spent one night in prison.

I had been told by
the detective that, uh,

"You've been charged
with m*rder.

Bail has been set at $250,000."

And I didn't think that when
you were charged with m*rder...

I mean, I didn't know nothing,
but you, you can't give

someone charged
with m*rder a bail,

because they're going to run away,
of course!

But was your intention
when you put up

the $250,000 to run away?

Oh, good-bye, $250,000.

Good-bye, jail.
I'm, I'm out!

Manhattan
real estate heir Robert Durst

back in custody.

Busted while trying
to shoplift a $6.00

chicken salad sandwich
at a Pennsylvania market.

I went into the Wegmans
to do grocery shopping,

get the newspaper.

I don't know what gave me the
idea that I should shoplift.

To see if I could get away with it,
or whatever it was.

But I decided
rather than to pay,

I was just going to take it.

And as I was leaving,

the, the two security people
were out front,

and they have to talk to me.

We're sorry.
You'll have to come with us.

Blah blah blah.

Idiotically, I went with them.

Um, and I was arrested.

Durst was wanted
for m*rder in Galveston, Texas,

and he's a suspect for
murders in Los Angeles

and Westchester County,
New York.

What about Susan Berman?

Did you have anything
to do with her m*rder?

Why were you bald?

- I was on the lam.
- I was trying to disguise myself,

and that worked real good.

Did you shave your eyebrows?

- Everything.
- Why?

It looks more like a...
Less like me.

You, you look like a...
You look weird

with your eyebrows shaved
in addition to your head.

And that was intentional?

Yeah! How do you accidentally
shave your eyebrows?