Millionaire murderer on ventilator with Covid days after sentencing
17 October 2021, 14:13
A US millionaire and former property mogul is on a ventilator with coronavirus just days after being found guilty of murder.
Robert Durst's lawyer confirmed he had tested positive for Covid on Saturday.
The 78-year-old has multiple underlying health conditions and his condition visibly worsened throughout his four-month trial.
Durst's lawyer, Dick DeGuerin, said: "His health deteriorated over the weeks of the trial.
"On Thursday, he looked like death warmed over."
Durst was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole on Thursday for the murder of his best friend, Susan Berman, in December 2000.
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Journalist and screenwriter Mrs Berman was shot at point-blank range in the head at her home.
The prosecution convinced the jury Durst killed Mrs Berman because he feared she was going to tell investigators information she had learned when she was his media spokesperson after the 1982 disappearance of his first wife, Kathie McCormack Durst.
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Mrs Berman's death had been unsolved until Durst participated in a documentary in 2015 that discovered new evidence and caught him in an astonishing confession.
At the end of the docuseries Durst is heard muttering: "What the hell did I do? Killed them all, of course."
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His first wife disappeared in 1982 and is presumed dead.
Charges have never been brought against Durst for her murder, but he faces possible indictment in New York after a district attorney reopened the investigation this year.
US authorities believe Durst has killed three people. He was acquitted of the murder of a neighbour, Morris Black, in 2001, arguing he acted in self-defence before cutting up his body.
The Los Angeles Superior Court, where the sentencing hearing occurred, confirmed someone present at the hearing had since tested positive for the virus, but no further cases have yet been reported.
