Robert Durst, subject of HBOs The Jinx, arrested in New Orleans on Sunday
A lot of people have been watching HBO’s The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst. The documentary/investigative series is directed by Andrew Jarecki, director of the acclaimed documentary Capturing the Friedmans and the feature film All Good Things (which seems like a barely fictional version of Robert Durst’s life). It was Jarecki’s idea for a high-quality documentary series investigating how a wealthy New York scion, Robert Durst, has basically gotten away with murdering several people over the course of decades. It’s like True Detective, only this really happened. I haven’t been watching the show, but I have been following the developments in the past few weeks, especially because the documentary series has turned up legitimate new evidence (which they turned over to police).
Durst is now 71 years old. When the new evidence was uncovered – in Durst’s alleged murder of writer Susan Berman in LA in 2000 – Durst did what he always does, he got the hell out of Dodge. He was arrested in New Orleans yesterday, having checked into a hotel under an assumed name. The NOPD arrested him at the behest of the LAPD, and LA County is looking to extradite Durst. He says he won’t fight the extradition. His arrest came down just hours before HBO aired Durst’s final interview for The Jinx. Durst – perhaps not realizing that his mic was still live – admitted that he “killed them all.”
It almost sounded like a confession. At the end of Robert Durst’s final interview for the HBO docuseries The Jinx, he heads into the bathroom while fully miked. Seemingly unaware that he was being recorded, he talked to himself. “You’re caught,” he mumbled. “You’re right, of course. But, you can’t imagine. Arrest him.”
“What the hell did I do?” he continued. “Killed them all, of course.”
It’s unclear whether this was a confession, but the FBI did arrest Durst on Saturday afternoon in New Orleans. (The FBI had been investigating Durst apart from the documentary and there’s no evidence that they arrested him because of his confession on Sunday’s episode.)
The arrest may have come at the right time. Durst seemingly had all the tools for a clean getaway. According to a law enforcement source familiar with the investigation, Durst had checked into a Mariott in New Orleans under a false name. In his possession, according to the source: a fake passport, other falsified documents, and a large amount of cash.
“It was obvious that he planned to get the hell out of Dodge,” says the law enforcement source, noting that Durst was arrested on a capital murder warrant. “It was the first day that the New Orleans airport was offering flights to Cuba, so that’s where we think he was going.”
Durst, 71, is accused of killing his friend Susan Berman, who was found shot execution-style in her California home in 2000. It’s not Durst’s only brush with the law. He has widely been suspected in the 1982 disappearance of his wife, Kathleen Durst. In 2001, he was arrested for the murder and dismemberment of neighbor Morris Black. He was later acquitted.
This is sort of amazing, right? That an in-depth investigative docu-series turned up new evidence AND a confession/admission? That the evidence is being used to arrest an alleged murderer three times over?
The LA Times has a longer breakdown of the murder of Susan Berman and the case against Durst – go here to read. Do I think Durst will finally have to pay for his crimes? Eh. Maybe. The Jinx has been really damaging, I’ll say that.
Photos courtesy of HBO, Getty.
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