Durst Case Hears More Dramatic Testimony

Prosecutors hope to make the case that New York real estate heir Robert Durst killed his first wife, Kathleen, and then shot a longtime friend and confidante who knew about it. Miriam Barnes said at a hearing this week that she visited Susan Berman decades ago, and remembers Berman pacing and biting her lip, then telling her: “If anything ever happens to me, Bobby did it.” That conversation took place shortly after Durst’s first wife disappeared in 1982. Nearly two decades later, in 2000, Berman was murdered in her Benedict Canyon home. Barnes was the second witness to tell a Los Angeles courtroom that they had reason to believe Berman knew something damaging about Durst before she was killed. Berman had served as Durst’s unofficial spokeswoman after Kathleen’s disappearance, and police had hoped to interview her shortly before her death. Prosecutors are calling four witnesses to the stand this week, hoping to preserve their testimony before they die too. The trial is unlikely to begin before 2018.