Killer Stories with Harvey Guillén - Robert Durst Pt. 1: “Bridge, Dig, Boat, Shovel”

Episode Date: February 6, 2023

Before he was the subject of HBO’s “The Jinx,” he was the son of a wealthy real estate developer who had everything at his disposal. As he grows up he finds a best friend in Susan Berman and marries his first wife Kathie. Within decades, they’d both be gone — one vanished, one murdered.  This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Today Vanessa is joined by Haesue Jo, Licensed Therapist & Head of Clinical Operations at BetterHelp. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Due to the graphic nature of this episode, listener discretion is advised. This episode contains discussions of domestic abuse, animal cruelty, suicide, and murder. Extreme caution is advised for listeners under 13. It was the year 2000, a few days before Christmas, and Robert Durst had been driving for hours. The same frantic thoughts repeated over and over again in his mind. He felt the walls closing in. Investigators in New York had reopened. the decades-old case into his wife's disappearance. And now he desperately needed to cut a crucial

loose end. As he pulled off the 4 or 5 freeway, he saw lights hung up on houses along the roads of the upscale Los Angeles suburb of Benedict Canyon. His hands tightly gripped the wheel as he wove through the residential streets. He was going to his best friend, Susan Berman's house. He told her the visit was just a holiday meetup. But that was a lot. lie. As he exited the car, he grabbed his 9mm pistol and stuffed it in his jacket pocket. Before he had a chance to change his mind, he hurried to Susan's door. And not. She opened it with a smile, not knowing that within the hour, she'd be dead. Hi, I'm Greg Paulson. This is Serial Killers, a Spotify original from Parkast. Every episode,

we dive into the minds and madness of serial killers. Today, we're plunging into the world of the ultra-rich to get up close and personal with Robert Durst. Although he was never convicted of enough murders to be classified as a serial killer, anecdotal evidence suggests that's exactly what he was. I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Richardson. Hi, everyone. You can find episodes of serial killers

and all other Spotify originals from Parcast for free on Spotify. Today, we'll explore a Silver Spooned child. that set Robert Durst up with a life of getting whatever he wanted. Then we'll discuss a disappearance and the execution-style hit of two people, Durst claim to love. Next time, we'll take you through the murder trial that captivated a nation, the verdict that left everyone reeling and the stunning admission that made headlines around the world. We've got all that and more coming up. Stay with us.

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like violence or substance abuse. Or else it's because there's an element that's lacking, like parental affection or money. We usually start in those places because they're easy red flags to spot, things we can point to as markers for why someone might have turned out so horribly wrong. But every now and again,

we get a story where our subject has everything going for them, And when that happens, it's tricky to find which thread first began the unraveling. Of course, that's likely by design. Wealthy families like the Dursts are notorious for their ironclad defenses against snooping. But when it comes to Robert Durst, there's enough information for us to at least sketch a rough picture. Even when he was born in 1943, Durst's family was rich. Their money came from savvy Manhattan real estate purchases, his grandfather made in the early part of the 20th century,

and their wealth only grew from there. Durst wanted for nothing growing up. Vanessa is going to take over on the psychology here and throughout the episode. As a reminder, she's not a licensed psychologist or psychiatrist, but we have done a lot of research for this show. Thanks, Greg. Because we don't know a lot about the specific events of Durst's childhood, we're going to have to speculate here and there throughout his story.

This is one of those times, and I'll tell you why. Some experts believe that growing up with an abundance of wealth can lead to a host of issues, like materialism, a lack of motivation, or an inhibited sense of right and wrong. You might have heard of this concept described as affluenza. It isn't recognized in any addition of the DSM, but it's been used in court to excuse violent behavior by rich or entitled young people. The argument basically boils down to an affluent kid, never hearing the word no. Because of this, it suggested that they might not understand the consequences of their actions,

including violent or reckless acts. Whether Durst experienced this kind of environment as a child, we can't say. But throughout his story, you'll notice punishment doesn't seem to be something he fears or even considers. That said, we don't know if Durst misbehaved as a young boy growing up in Westchester, New York. He and his relatives never had much to say about his childhood. He reported having fond memories of his mother, but she died when he was seven. In an incident usually described as suicide, but occasionally reported as an accident. After that, Durst said that his father spent the majority of his time at the family business,

perhaps suggesting that Seymour didn't help his children through their grief. But Durst's younger brother Douglas refuted that idea. He said that their father loved Durst very much. The fact that the brothers disagreed isn't surprising. It seems like the only thing they ever did agree on was that they never got along. From a young age, their relationship was tumultuous at best. Durst joked that it started when Douglas stole his toys, but Douglas remembered that his older brother was a bully.

Outside of the family, Durst was a loner at school and struggled in his classes. Because of his middling grades, he seemed determined to impress his father in other ways. In one instance, Durst claimed he played tuba for the school band. That was a lie, but he really committed to the ruse. He even went so far as to bring home a prop instrument as evidence. He then stashed the tuba in the woods on his way to school. While odd, it showed the lengths Durst would go to in order to please his father, and soon he actually succeeded.

Despite a ho-hum performance in high school, Durst went on to Lehigh University in Pennsylvania. He graduated with an economics degree in 1965. something his father surely approved of. And Durst must have done well as an undergrad, because he was eventually accepted into a doctoral program at UCLA. There he met Susan Berman. Like Durst, she grew up wealthy in New York, but unlike his family,

the Bermans made their fortune in a slightly different way. Susan's father had been a powerful mobster with ties to New York and Las Vegas. Just as Durst had lost his mother at a young age, Susan had endured the death of both her father and mother during childhood. Soon, this initial common bond turned into a close friendship. Susan was said to be incredibly loyal and used to tell friends that Durst needed her. Exactly what he needed her for wasn't clear, but she certainly had a big role in Durst life.

Even after he left UCLA and moved to Manhattan in 1969, the pair stayed in touch. When they talked, he told Susan about everything, including which women he was done. dating. So it's easy to imagine him telling Susan all about 19-year-old Kathleen McCormack. Kathleen, who everyone called Kathy, grew up in an entirely different world from Durst. Her working-class family was from New Jersey, and she had a job in a dentist office to pay the bills while she studied nursing. In 1971, 28-year-old Durst swept the young, outgoing Kathy off her feet with his understated charm. He impressed her with an interest in architecture and his sculpting hobby. Then, after just two dates in New York City, he asked her to move to Vermont, where he'd

opened up a health food store. In January 1972, she did just that. From there, things moved fast. The pair married a year later, though not before signing a pre-up that protected Dirst's wealth. That hardly matter to Kathy, though. The idyllic New England setting gave them everything a young couple could have wanted. But this peaceful existence didn't last. Later that year, the 30-year-old said that his father insisted he joined the family real estate business. Durs didn't want to move back to Manhattan, but as the eldest child, he was the heir apparent to the Dursd family legacy. By this point in the 1970s, Dirt's father, Seymour, had grown the business into a real estate juggernaut,

while transforming the New York City skyline. They'd pivoted into construction and management and owned several skyscrapers throughout Manhattan. Even though Durst had no interest in the company, he begrudgingly went along with his father's wishes. He and Kathy split their time between a penthouse on Riverside Drive and a quiet lakeside cottage in South Salem, about 50 miles north.

To most, Durst's life might have sounded perfect. He was married to a beautiful, intelligent woman had been handed a key role in his family's successful business and had two gorgeous homes. But he wasn't happy. His family had interfered in his life. And if there's one thing Dirst didn't do well, it was family. And not just his own, but Kathy's too. By his own admission, Dirst didn't treat his in-laws well. He had no interest in spending time with him and resented Kathy for making him, his egotistical and demeaning behavior towards them upset Kathy, but he didn't seem to care. He wanted things his way, no matter what. He threw fits when he didn't get what he wanted or was pressured into doing

things he didn't care to do. And sometimes he even got violent. One time, at an event with Kathy's family, Dirst decided he was ready to leave. So he grabbed his wife by the hair and pulled her from the room, horrifying everyone present. That wasn't the only time he was cruel to Kathy. When she came to him in 1976 saying she was pregnant, he said he didn't want a baby. He demanded she get an abortion or he'd divorce her. Perhaps afraid that Durst would leave her with nothing, Kathy did as he said. Over the years, their marriage deteriorated, as Durst grew incredibly controlling. When they were each of their separate homes, he expected Kathy to call him constantly. If he took her to a business meeting, he told her how to act. According to News 12, Westchester, at one of the

these meetings, he dumped a gallon of water on her when she disagreed with him. Keeping a tight grip on his wife got more challenging, though. Kathy had a nursing qualification, but she wanted to be a pediatrician, so she enrolled in medical school in the Bronx. Her desire for a career might have made Durst feel insecure. If she could earn her own money, what would she need him for? Maybe that's why he refused to pay for her tuition, because he wasn't usually stingy with their funds. He often used to, He even used his money and connections to get the couple's close friends into exclusive clubs and restaurants.

He also developed a love of Alaskan Malamutes, a high-maintenance and often expensive dog breed. What was strange about the dogs was that Dirst named them all Igor, and each of them died one after another. Dirst insisted they were only three of them and had explanations for each death. Still, his brother Douglas suggested that they were seven, and that Dirst had killed them all. If Kathy felt disturbed by the strange pattern with the dogs, she probably didn't have much time to dwell on it. As 1981 drew to a close,

she was only months away from graduating medical school, and she was also reaching the end of her rope. The abuse hadn't stopped, and in January of 1982, Kathy went to a medical center with injuries to her face and reported that she was a victim of domestic violence. However, she stopped short of naming her husband, or abuser. Maybe the incident that sent her to the emergency room was the final straw,

or maybe it was just one of many. According to various reports, Kathy then hired a divorce attorney who put together a settlement to present a Durst. She'd had enough. It was time to get out. But it seemed like someone had other plans for her. Coming up, Kathy Durst goes missing. Thanks to our sponsor BetterHelp. Today I'm sitting down with Hesu Joe, licensed therapist and head of clinical operations at BetterHelp, to discuss mental health, the human experience, and my journey with therapy. Hesu, can you tell me about online therapy? How does it work?

And is it effective? It's not that different from traditional in-person therapy. It's just you're not meeting in an office anymore. You're meeting through your device. So you're still able to connect with a real-life person. In terms of efficacy, we use questions from common assessments like the GAD 7, PHQ9, and others. And what we're finding so far is that a lot of clients, over time, report lessened symptoms. You're incorporating skills that you learn with your therapist into your real life relationships.

And you schedule your weekly sessions just like you would in traditional therapy. And then you work towards a healthy, happy, functioning life. As the world's largest therapy service, better how to be able to be able to be in traditional therapy service, BetterHelp has matched over 3 million people with professionally licensed therapists that are available 100% online. Learn more and save 10% off your first month at BetterHelp.com slash parcast. That's BetterH-E-L-P.com slash parcast. This episode is brought to you by Prime. Obsession is in session.

And this summer, Prime Originals have everything you want. Steamy romances, irresistible love stories, the book to screen favorites you've already read twice. Off campus, L, every year after, the love hypothesis, Sterling Point, and more. Slow burns, second chances, chemistry you can feel through the screen. Your next obsession is waiting. Watch only on Prime. Now back to the story. On January 28, 1982, Kathy Durst's lawyer called her with news. Her husband, Robert Durst, had rejected the divorce settlement. Locked into a pre-up that would have left her penniless,

the 29-year-old must have felt trapped. Her abusive, controlling husband wouldn't let her go on fair terms, and she was about to graduate from medical school with a mountain of debt. She told many of her friends that she worried about what Dirst might do to her. She knew the abuse would continue, and she feared how far he might go. Kathy also told them to suspect Dirst if she went missing. Durst's violent history with his wife indicates that he possibly experienced rejection-sensitive

dysphoria, which manifests an extreme emotional sensitivity to any kind of rejection or criticism. The slight doesn't even have to be real. It could be an imagined injury that triggers someone's RSD. If this was the case with Durst, Kathy's attempts to divorce him might have incited what happened next. That said, the story differs depending on if you believe Durst or the story. the evidence. Going by what investigators think, on January 31st, Kathy arrived at her best friend Gilles Baird's

house in Newtown, Connecticut. There was a party there. Kathy said she had to get away from her husband and spent the afternoon and early evening trying not to think about Dirst. Except he made any kind of respite difficult. He called Gielbert's house around 7 p.m., insisting that Kathy meet him at their South Salem home, 20 miles. away. Exactly what they said we don't know, but it sounded like an argument to those who overheard. Before she left for South Salem, Kathy told Gilles Baird that she was afraid of her husband, of what he might do. Not for the first time, she begged Gilles Baird to look into it, if anything happened. Once Kathy Dursd drove away, Gilles Bert never saw her again.

The next time anyone supposedly heard from Kathy was the following morning. That's when she called the dean of her medical school to say she was sick and wouldn't be in class. Later that week, when Kathy didn't show up to meet with Gilles Berte at a Manhattan restaurant, her friends began calling one another to see if anyone had heard from her. They surely called Dirst, who feigned ignorance. He even got in on the act, calling a few people to see if they'd seen her. However, he didn't call the police until a few days after Gilles Bert began looking. When the 38-year-old went to the third.

the police to report his wife missing. It had been five days since her last sighting. According to Durs' account of the last night he saw her, Kathy came home to their South Salem cottage from Gilles Burt's place, and the pair started arguing. When things calmed down, they shared a sandwich and Kathy drank a bottle of wine. An hour or so later, Dursk drove her to the Catona train station so she could go back to their Manhattan apartment. After that, Dirst told police that he went back to the cottage. and had a drink with his neighbor and walked the dog. Then he called their New York apartment from a pay phone

so he could talk to Kathy before she went to bed. There are a lot of issues with Durst's story, and you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone who believes this version of events. Durst even later admitted that he lied to the police when he talked to them about Kathy. He changed his story several times during the initial questioning so he could get the whole process over with as quickly as possible. Of course, some of the suspicions

about Dirt's involvement in his wife's disappearance are due to hindsight, but not all of it. And it's possible that his status as a member of one of New York's richest families offered him a certain amount of insulation. We can guess that because the police never officially suspected foul play, which seems odd in a case like this. When a woman goes missing, the popular refrain is always, the husband did it, but not here. Dirst suggested to investigators that Kathy might have run off with another man, perhaps a drug dealer, he said. Whether anyone bought that detail is unclear, but some were inclined to believe that she might have got into hiding to escape her toxic marriage.

That theory might hold more water had Kathy not been just months away from graduating medical school. Plenty of other things about Kathy's disappearance seemed suspicious. Like her belongings being found in their Manhattan apartment building's trash compactor just days after she vanished. Or a note Kathy's friends found in Durst trash. It was an ominous list of words that read like a chilling to-do for someone getting rid of a body. Town dump, bridge, dig, boat, other, shovel, car, truck, wrench. Not all of these details made it into the press. Coverage of Kathy's case seemed limited to the cash reward Durst offered for information. That and the repeated expressions of shock that such a well-connected family could experience something like this.

Eventually, the case's attention became too much for Durst, and he hired a criminal defense attorney who insisted all police communication go through him. Durst also eventually hired a private investigator through his lawyer, one he tasked with tracking Kathy down. Despite the Durst family's virtually limitless resources, it seems this PI was their only real effort to get answers. and whatever he did turn up wasn't shared with the police. Whether that was because nothing turned up or for some other reason, we can't say.

The lawyer and the PI weren't the only proxies Durst had working for him. Remember his friend Susan Berman from UCLA? Well, she'd become a well-respected journalist and author. She'd written a memoir about her father's mob activities, including his involvement in developing Las Vegas. After Kathy's disappearance, she became a kind of spokesperson. for her best friend, Durst, and took care of all of his media inquiries. She also loudly promoted the idea that Kathy had made it home to her Manhattan apartment on January 31st,

which became a central part of the timeline. So much of what happened to Kathy Durst comes down to speculation, so we have to tell you that what we're discussing next has never been proven in a court of law. But it's a theory you'll find holds weight once you know everything about Robert Durst's story. Remember, Kathy supposedly called her school to tell them she was sick. This happened on February 1st. Well, there's a popular theory that Susan Berman actually made the call to help Durst cover up Kathy's murder on the night she supposedly left for Manhattan. Again, there's a lot of guesswork going on here because Kathy Durst was never found, alive or dead. However, in the days after she was last seen, several unusual collect phone calls

came into the Durst organization from a unique location, shipped. Bottom, New Jersey. While the identity of the caller was never verified, as far as we know, Robert Durst was the only person who regularly made collect calls to the family's company. And that part of New Jersey has long been a strangely popular place for mobsters to bury bodies. Whether this is significant or just a coincidence is hard to tell. And we aren't even sure if this information was available or of interest to investigators. With no substantial leads in the first few months, the case rapidly cooled off. Kathy's friends kept up the search and repeatedly checked in with law

enforcement, hoping for updates. But nothing changed. Kathy Durst was gone. And though it's never been proven, she might have been Durst's first murder. After the investigation wound down, Durst laid low. Susan told people he was distraught and wouldn't return calls for a while. What he did for the next year or so isn't clear, but by the end of 1983, he was back at work for the family business. This time, his behavior was noticeably strange. Durst had always displayed some odd ticks that people found off-putting, like his tendency to burp loudly in public. It's possible that these mannerisms were symptomatic of some kind of disorder, but it's also possible that he'd just like to push people's buttons. That's certainly what his younger brother Douglas believed. He

once told the New York Times that Durst was perfectly capable of conducting himself with professionalism in the workplace. However, he seemed to enjoy saying provocative things in family meetings, quote, to see how people would react. Douglas also believed that his brother was a psychopath, devoid of any emotions. It was his theory that Durst wanted to, quote, experience the emotions that other people have vicariously, because he has absolutely none of his own. Whether there's any truth to Douglas's speculation about his brother isn't clear. But it was no secret that the animosity between the brothers had gotten worse since childhood, and it seemed to be veering dangerously close to outright violence.

By the early 1990s, Durst kept a sharpened wrench on his desk, that frightened Douglas enough that he kept a piece of heavy pipe in his office in case he ever needed to defend himself. After hours, when the building was mostly empty, Durst sometimes crept into his brother's office, rifled through his papers and urinated in his waist paper basket. If Douglas was right and his brother was always in search of some kind of reaction, he didn't really succeed.

Although Douglas complained to the family, no one seemed inclined to do anything about Durst behavior. After all, he was the heir apparent, just years away from succeeding his father as head of the company. Eventually, though, things came to ahead, the now-50-something's bizarre behavior reached uncomfortable new. levels. For one thing, he sat in internal meetings mumbling to himself. Then he reportedly pulled his urinary prank on one of his uncles. That seemed to be the final straw, because around that

time, family leaders made a decision. Durst wouldn't take over the company when Seymour stepped down. Douglas would. After that, Durst stopped speaking to his father. In one fell swoop, he cut the man whose approval he'd craved out of his life. Over the years he loudly, he loudly admitted that he didn't want to be a part of the family business. And while that may have been true, his reaction to being passed over didn't feel like relief. He distanced himself from the business and his family. He stopped going to work, rented his own office, and spent much of the 1990s adrift. Exactly what he did during that time, we don't know. But he apparently sold the couple's South Salem Cottage and moved between Northern California, Connecticut, Dallas, and Manhattan. With access to the family

he was earning somewhere in the region of $2 million a year without having to lift a finger. Then in 1988, Durst met someone new, New York City real estate agent Deborah Lee Cheraton. He instantly took a liking to her. The problem was she was in the midst of a divorce. Without a second thought, he reportedly helped cover her legal fees just so he could be with her. Over the next decade, the pair dated, spending their time under the radar or gone. going on vacations all over the world. However, Robert Durst's new, seemingly peaceful life wasn't built to last. And in the year 2000, it all came crashing down.

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Call 1-800-545-9-9 or visit zepbounce.lily.com. Now back to the story. By the year 2000, Robert Durst had spent close to two decades trying to avoid any scrutiny over the disappearance of his first wife, Kathy. But it was all of. about to catch up with him. That fall, police in Westchester, New York, arrested a man for exposing himself to women. They brought him in for booking, processing, and questioning.

At first, everything about the encounter seemed routine. But as they talked to the man, something odd happened. In an apparent bid to cut some kind of deal, he told authorities he had information relating to a baffling cold case, the 1982 disappearance of Kathy Durst. The tip was a little more than a rumor that millionaire Robert Durst had murdered his wife in their South Salem cottage, then disposed of the body. It's not clear why, but the man's information

was apparently credible enough to get detectives to check it out. Investigators went to the cottage, which Durst no longer owned, and searched the place extensively. However, they found nothing to support the man's story. As far as we can tell, this was the first time authorities searched the place. It's likely because Durst told the police that his wife made it home to Manhattan

before she vanished and then reported her missing at a precinct on the city's upper west side, not near their upstate cottage. Although the tip was a dead end, it ignited interest in the decades-old cold case, and in October of that year, authorities officially reopened the investigation. That meant that detectives started reaching out to people close to Kathy and Durst, hoping they'd learned something new. When 57-year-old Dirste found out that the case was active again after almost 20 years, he panicked. And one of the first things he did was race out to buy a $70,000 engagement ring for Deborah.

In October of 2000, they married in an office building at a ceremony presided over by a rabbi plucked at random from the phone book. Dirsts then signed power of attorney over to Deborah to ensure that she was. she'd be entitled to his full inheritance when he died, because according to Durst, he was planning on taking his life at the time, though he never made any attempts that we know of. What's clear is that Durst wasn't at a good headspace

when he heard about the renewed interest in Kathy's case. And across the country in Los Angeles, his longtime friend Susan Berman was having her own difficulties. Earlier in her life, Susan had enjoyed some success as a journalist and author, but she'd fallen on hard times and asked friends for money to get by. One of these friends was Robert Durst, who sent her two checks for $25,000. Included with one of the checks was a handwritten note.

Susie, now and again I think about old times. Good luck, Bobby. During the course of the reopened investigation, people in New York had suggested that investigators speak with Susan about Kathy's disappearance. She'd been Dirt's closest confidant back then. So if anyone knew anything, it was her. Apparently, detectives took the advice seriously because they contacted Susan towards the end of the year, asking to set up a time they could fly out and interview her.

She wrote to Dirst to let him know that they were poking around. That letter sealed her fate. As we mentioned earlier, it's only speculation that Susan helped Dirst cover up his culpability in Kathy's disappearance. But what Durs did next lends credence to the idea that she did, or at least that she knew something incriminating. Because after that letter, Ders seemed to believe one thing. He needed to silence Susan, or else he'd pay a hefty price. And in his mind, that was an unacceptable outcome, which made it acceptable for him to take decisive action.

This kind of thinking is called individual relativism, which boils down to a person making judgment calls about what is right or wrong based on their beliefs and values. For someone like Durst, who likely grew up with a certain level of entitlement, his thinking about what he should or shouldn't do was skewed. Right and wrong, it didn't seem to matter. All he wanted to do was avoid punishment. And whether Durst made a snap decision or spent weeks planning it out, the outcome was the same. Susan had to die. Exactly what happened next has never been firmly. established, but here's what we know. At least two people told investigators that Susan was looking forward to Durst visiting her in L.A. around the holidays that year. And a few days before

Christmas, Durst flew to Trinidad in Northern California. After landing, he turned his cell phone off. From there, it's hard to be sure what the 57-year-old did. But it's likely he drove himself down the coast to Los Angeles. Once he arrived in the city around December 23rd, he headed for Susan's home in the neighborhood of Benedict Canyon, which sits alongside the affluent community of Bel Air. He got out of his car, walked towards the house, and knocked on the door. When Susan saw her friend, she was delighted.

They walked inside, and she likely gave him a quick tour of her house. Eventually, they ended up in her bedroom. Where the Dirst wasted time catching up with his oldest friend isn't clear. He had a job to do and might have just wanted to get it over with. At some point, when Susan turned her back, Dirst raised a 9-millimeter handgun, held it an inch from her head, and pulled the trigger. Afterwards, Dersl left Susan's body where it lay on the bedroom floor. He didn't bother to close the back door as he returned to his car.

Again, the exact timeline here is foggy, but at some point that day, Durst wrote a note with Susan Berman's address on it, along with the word cadaver. He slipped the paper inside an envelope, which he addressed to Beverly Hills Police, adding an extra E in Beverly. Then he put it in the mail and carried on. Why Durst sent that note has never become clear, but it's entirely possible but he felt guilty about killing his friend. and didn't want her to lie there long. However, if Durst did feel guilt over killing Susan, he didn't let it slow him down. He drove north, making it to San Francisco in time to fly back to New York late that evening.

From there, all of the fear and anxiety that had likely plagued Durst for weeks had vanished. No one was left alive to reveal his terrible secret. With thousands of miles between him and Susan's body, He surely thought he was in the clear. But things didn't go exactly to plan. On Christmas Eve, one of Susan's neighbors noticed her back door was wide open, and her dogs were running around the yard. Given that her father had been a mobster, Susan was a cautious person.

Some friends even called her paranoid, so it was unusual for her door to be unlocked, let alone left open. The concerned neighbor called the police, who arrived to find Susan's dead body and her dog's bloody paw prints tracked through the house. But as far as anyone could tell, there was no sign of her killer.

No one had any idea that the perpetrator was already across the country, blending in, acting shocked and horrified when news of Susan's death reached the East Coast. But it wouldn't be long before everyone saw through Durst's veneer

and recognized him as the monster he truly was. was. Thanks again for tuning in to serial killers. We'll be back next time with the second part of the story. After killing Susan Berman, Durst was desperate to lay low. But it wasn't long before everyone in the country knew the name, Robert Durst. For more information on Robert Durst, we found the HBO documentary series,

The Jinks, extremely helpful to our research. You can find all episodes of serial killers and all other Spotify originals from Parcast for free on Spotify. We'll see you next time. Stay safe out there. Serial Killers is a Spotify original from Parcast. Executive produced by Max Cutler, our head of programming is Julian Browro. Our supervising sound designer is Russell Nash, with Nick Johnson as our head of production, and quality control by Spencer Howard.

Stacey Nemick is our supervising editor, and Derek Jennings is our writing lead. This episode of Serial Killers was written by Joel Callan, edited by Robert Tyler Walker and Kate Murdoch, fact-checked by Haley Milliken, researched by Brian Petrus and Chelsea Wood, produced by Bruce Kitovich, and sound design by Michael Motion. Our hosts are Greg Polson and me, Vanessa Richardson. Hi, it's Carter and Molly from Conspiracy Theory. This February, join us for two standout specials. First, celebrate Super Bowl Sunday with a two-parter on one of the most dominant and dubious teams in history.

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