A Deadly Secret: The Story of Robert Durst

by Matt Birkbeck

  Becerra didn’t think there would be a problem. He had a track record with Pirro, having brought other investigations before her, and they had a good relationship. But thanks to her husband’s troubles, the district attorney sat there with Joe Becerra and a deputy, picking up only bits and pieces of the conversation about the missing wife and Becerra’s intention to begin a new investigation.

  Pirro ended the meeting quickly.

  “Go ahead,” she told Becerra. “Just keep us informed.”

  —

  Becerra wasted no time in lining up his interviews with the family and friends of Kathie Durst. He found all the names in the file. Some had been interviewed back in 1982, others were merely mentioned. All were still alive and most were still living in the New York area. Eleanor Schwank, who now used her middle name Joy, was living in Matagorda, Texas, a coastal town south of Houston. Becerra figured he’d begin the investigation by reaching out to Kathie’s family.

  When the phone rang at Jim McCormack’s home in suburban Sparta, New Jersey, he was working at his desk in the basement fielding some paperwork for his sports merchandising business. His wife, Sharon, answered the call.

  “Get up here, you have to get up here,” she called down.

  Jim didn’t quite understand, but looked up the stairs and saw his wife standing at the doorway, holding a phone, frantically waving, so he figured it must be something important.

  “Who is it?” he whispered.

  “An investigator with the New York State Police,” she said, her hand over the phone. “He says he wants to talk to you. He wouldn’t say why.”

  Jim grabbed the phone and listened as the voice on the other end of the line explained that his name was Joe Becerra, that he was reopening the investigation into the disappearance of Jim’s sister Kathie Durst, and that he’d like to interview members of the family.

  Jim’s immediate thought was to tell this investigator not to waste his time. The NYPD had tried it, not just once but three times, with detectives knocking on his door as late as 1986. Nothing ever came of it, except the reopening of old painful wounds and the resurfacing of terrible memories.

  “My sister didn’t disappear,” said Jim.

  “I know,” said Becerra. “I read the file. I have a lot of questions, but I need to speak with the family to start getting some answers.”

  Jim paused for a moment.

  “You said you were with the New York State Police, right? Can you give me your number and I’ll call you right back.”

  A thought occurred to Jim that perhaps he wasn’t talking to a New York State trooper. So he took Becerra’s number and dialed. The voice on the other end of line answered, “State police, Somers barracks.” Jim asked for Joe Becerra.

  “Sorry about that,” said Jim. “I just wanted to be sure you were who you said you were. You have no idea what we’ve gone through over the years since my sister disappeared.”

  Becerra said he understood, then continued the conversation, asking if Jim and his siblings would be available for interviews.

  Jim felt more relaxed now that he was certain he was talking to an investigator with the New York State Police, but he wondered why, after all this time, the New York State Police were interested in this case.

  “What are you going to do that the city police didn’t do before?” said Jim.

  “Mr. McCormack, I’m interested in the house, the one your sister owned in South Salem. It’s in my jurisdiction. I read the NYPD file, and I know about the discrepancies in Mr. Durst’s statements. And I know your family believes he killed your sister. If you can give me your cooperation, I promise you, I’ll get some answers.”

  Jim agreed to meet with Becerra, a renewed sense of hope overwhelming him. He handed the phone back to his wife, walked into his kitchen, pulled a beer out of the refrigerator, and took a long gulp.

  Sharon followed him into the kitchen.

  “They’re investigating again? Why, why now?”

  “He says he read the file and there were things that didn’t add up. He wants to search the South Salem home,” said Jim, taking another long swig.

  “After all this time,” said Sharon, who took a seat by the kitchen table. “You know your sisters are not going to be happy with this. And neither is your mother.”

  Jim rolled his eyes, finished off his beer, and walked upstairs.

  Sharon remained at the table, a tear falling down her cheek, her own memories rushing to the surface.

  She was only twenty-three when she began dating Jim, who was nine years older. She had heard about the McCormack sister who married a millionaire and was nervous when Jim told her Kathie had invited them to a party at the Westchester home of Doug Durst, Bobby’s younger brother.

  Sharon remembered walking up to the front door of the estate, surprised that a family like the Dursts would keep their property in such a state of disrepair. The lawn grew wildly and was in desperate need of a trimming; the driveway pavement was cracked and broken. Home is where the heart was, thought Sharon, and this home was in desperate need of a coronary transplant.

  But Sharon wasn’t there to visit with the Dursts; she was there to finally meet Kathie, Jim’s little sister, who was at the party with her husband, Bobby.

  Sharon had heard so much about the youngest sister with the rich husband, and it was Kathie who opened the front door, offering a wide, beautiful smile and hug for her big brother and a warm hug for her brother’s pretty new girlfriend.

  Kathie was beautiful, so fine, Sharon had thought. She wore a long Indian skirt with sandals, her hair twirled into French braids that hung down to her shoulders. By the end of the afternoon Sharon was certain that Kathie was the classiest woman at the party. She even looked at Jim a different way after meeting his sister. If he could have a sibling as warm and pleasant as Kathie, then there must be something good and decent and warm about Jim.

  It had to be in the genes, she thought.

  As for the hosts, as good as Sharon felt about Kathie, she felt equally repulsed by the Dursts, who were cold and arrogant throughout the afternoon, remaining in their little cliques. It was always Kathie who handled the introductions. Bobby was there, but said little. He remained in a corner, a beer in his hand, quietly talking to his friends—Susan Berman and Doug Oliver.

  Sharon felt like an intruder and couldn’t wait to leave, and she couldn’t wait to see Kathie again.

  —

  The message on Gilberte Najamy’s answering machine left her breathless. She put her hand to her chest, mouthed “Oh, my God,” and dialed the pager number left by Joe Becerra.

  Five minutes later her phone rang.

  Gilberte was stunned when Becerra explained that he was reopening the Durst investigation. So surprised, and paranoid, was Gilberte that it took several minutes for Becerra to convince her that he really was an investigator with the New York State Police.

  “You know, I spent thousands on hiring private detectives. I spent so much money I eventually lost my catering business,” said Gilberte. “They even robbed my house, stole documents that Kathie had given to me.”

  Gilberte was spitting out information, going far too fast for Becerra to follow.

  “You need to slow down, okay? Now, you were saying something about documents?”

  “Yes, tax returns and stock transfers and Durst company papers on properties they owned or were going to buy around Times Square. She gave it all to me and told me to hold on to it. A year after she disappeared, my house was robbed and the papers were taken.”

  “Did you report that?” said Becerra.

  “No. After Kathie disappeared I didn’t trust the police. I didn’t trust anyone. The Dursts have so much money, I didn’t know who to trust.”

  “Well, right now you can trust me, okay?”

  They talked on the phone for more than an hour with Gilber
te telling Becerra that she thought about Kathie every day, that she had always known the truth would finally emerge, and that she wanted to help any way she could.

  Gilberte immediately determined that she liked Joe Becerra and was beside herself with delight when Becerra said he was going to search the house in South Salem.

  “That’s what I told that idiot Mike Struk after Kathie disappeared! I told him to go there, but he wouldn’t listen to me! I told him she never got on that train that night, and I told him I broke into the house and it didn’t look right, and I told him Bobby was throwing Kathie’s stuff in the garbage! I told him all that and he ignored me. He was bought off, I know he was. The Dursts got to him!”

  Becerra didn’t say a word as Gilberte spewed nearly eighteen years’ worth of frustration. When she was finished, Becerra said he wanted to schedule a meeting at the barracks to review the case.

  Gilberte agreed, asking if she could bring along another old friend, Kathy Traystman.

  Becerra agreed, and asked Gilberte to keep quiet about his call.

  After hanging up the phone, Gilberte turned to her partner, Andrea.

  “I can’t believe it,” she cried. “They reopened the case. They’re going after Bobby. After all this time, they’re going after Bobby.”

  —

  Endless traffic jams made the drive from Westchester to Long Island difficult, first on the Cross Island Expressway coming off the Throgs Neck Bridge, then on the Long Island Expressway heading east toward New Hyde Park.

  When Becerra finally entered the modest home of Ann McCormack, she was sitting in her kitchen, gazing out a window, and offered little reaction when he broke the news to her.

  Ann didn’t want to meet with the investigator, and did so only after a long discussion with her daughter Mary, who spoke with Becerra and wanted her mother to give him a chance to explain what he was doing.

  “I can’t do this,” said Ann.

  “I know, Mom. It’s going to be hard on all of us. But I spoke with this investigator and he’s serious. I have a good feeling about him,” said Mary.

  Ann was polite enough when Becerra arrived, offering him a drink and something to eat. She was now in her mid-eighties and relegated to spending most of her time at her home. She had learned to come to terms with the loss of her daughter, even though there was no body, no funeral, no grave to visit. There was never a last good-bye—just a call one evening that her precious daughter, a medical student, was missing. That was it. Ann would often finding herself sitting in Kathie’s old bedroom, sobbing as she remembered her beautiful baby.

  The first few years had been the hardest, particularly after the hearing in 1983, when the courts turned down Ann’s request to become temporary administrator of her daughter’s estate. There wasn’t much there, less than $50,000. But Bobby had challenged Ann, and won.

  “I don’t think you know what we as a family went through with the Dursts,” said Ann. “You’re sitting here telling me that you think you can resolve this case, but do you really know anything about it? Do you know we went to court? I went to court, to look over my own daughter’s estate, and that monster challenged me and won. Did you know that?”

  “No,” said Becerra. “I didn’t.”

  “Then you don’t know about the stock-transfer documents held in Kathie’s name but forged by Bobby, who wanted to sell them. And you don’t know that he tried to sublet the East Eighty-sixth Street apartment my daughter had even before he reported Kathie missing. And you don’t know that my daughter Mary went to the Riverside Drive apartment and found all of Kathie’s jewelry—her diamond earrings, a watch, a wedding band, and two gold chains—after Bobby told us she was wearing the jewelry when she disappeared. Did you know all of that?”

  Becerra said nothing. It was obvious Ann was carrying a deep pain, not just over the loss of her daughter, but a result of the obvious frustrations from years of dealing with a criminal justice system she believed had failed her.

  “How can we, Mr. Becerra, this little family from Long Island, ever even hope to fight people like the Dursts? Justice? What justice is there for people like us? We tried it before, and we failed. I really don’t have the energy to try it again. My daughter is dead, Mr. Becerra, and I’ve come to terms with that. If you want to investigate, if you really think you can bring closure for my family, go right ahead. But I can’t help you.”

  —

  Janet Finke wasn’t particularly happy to receive a phone call from Joe Becerra, and far less thrilled to learn that the state police investigator had found her after arresting her brother, Todd, on New Year’s Day. It was a fortunate break for Becerra, who had been having difficulty locating Finke, who was remarried and living under a different name. She was far removed from those crazed years when she was married to Alan Martin, and even before that, when she worked as the Dursts’ cleaning lady.

  Janet had been only sixteen when she started her home-cleaning service. She was bright, enterprising, and very pretty—tall with long blond hair. The Dursts became clients, and in her early twenties she became friendly with Kathie, who treated her like the younger sister that Kathie had never had. There was a period in the late 1970s when Janet lived with Kathie and Bobby, whom she called Bob, in their Manhattan apartment, and on Kathie’s days off from medical school, the two women would socialize, visiting dance clubs and restaurants.

  When they were in South Salem they visited the home of Keith Richards, the Rolling Stones guitarist who had a house there. Richards kept peculiar hours, sleeping till four or five in the afternoon, then staying up all night drinking and playing music. Every once in a while Mick Jagger would show up and they’d have impromptu jam sessions in the backyard, which infuriated Richards’s neighbors.

  Janet and Kathie had even gone together to a party at the Playboy Mansion in California. When they returned, they said little about their trip, but their smiles spoke volumes.

  Janet saw the best and worst of Kathie and Bobby. She remembered clearly that Bobby was sensitive and generous, a quiet man who, despite rumors of his cheapness, always paid the bill at restaurants. On occasion he’d even crack a joke. He was as easygoing as they came and exhibited very little ego for a man of his wealth and means. Women loved him. Not sexually, but emotionally. They felt his sensitivity and wanted to mother him.

  Kathie was far more pleasant, and exuded a brilliant warmth that drew people close to her.

  Best of all, she could talk for hours, and the two women would do just that, talk and talk and talk.

  While Kathie was in medical school she talked about working with children, perhaps as a pediatrician, and even mentioned that she still hoped to be a mother one day.

  They’d talk about Janet’s boyfriend, Kim, an unassuming man who worked as a landscaper. They had gone out for five years, breaking up shortly before Kathie disappeared.

  Becerra told Janet that he had begun the investigation two months earlier after speaking to her former brother-in-law, Timmy Martin. Janet was irate to learn that Martin was not in jail and wanted to know who let that “fucking wacko” back on the streets.

  “I can’t believe he’s out on probation,” Janet said. “Not only does he burglarize homes and participate in nearly every crime imaginable, but he’s also masturbating in front of women—in public! Right now I’d worry less about Bob Durst and more about Tim Martin. He should have been locked up years ago.”

  Becerra said nothing else about Martin, moving the conversation along to the Dursts. As Janet told her stories of the good times with Bobby Durst, there were incidents she couldn’t explain, and behavior she could only question.

  She remembered clearly that Bobby would disappear, sometimes for days at a time, without so much as saying good-bye. Upon his return he’d never say where he’d been, offering instead weak excuses that he was scouting a potential out-of-town real estate purchase.

 
And Janet remembered when Kathie told her about the Polaroids she found in the drawer, the ones Bobby had taken of the apartment, including the closets and bathrooms. The explanation, said Janet, was that Bobby was having an affair. But Janet never bought into that.

  “That had nothing to do with another woman,” said Janet.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” said Becerra.

  “Just that, it had nothing to do with another woman. Do you have any idea how weird he could be? Think about it. Changing the inside of a closet and medicine cabinet? That’s got nothing to do with a woman.”

  “What do you think it’s about?”

  “You don’t want to know what I’m thinking,” said Janet. “Look, I haven’t heard from Bob in years. I have a new husband, children, and a new life. I don’t think I can give you much.”

  But Janet did have a suggestion—that Becerra should have a conversation with Liz Jones. Liz had taken Janet’s place and had been cleaning the Dursts’ South Salem home when Kathie disappeared.

  “Talk to Liz,” said Janet. “She’ll tell you about the blood.”

  —

  Liz Jones still lived in South Salem. Like Janet Finke, the police had never interviewed her in 1982, a fact that Becerra found odd.

  Liz had been cleaning the Durst home for about a year, given the job by Janet. She was in the house that Tuesday, February 2, two days after Kathie disappeared, and told Becerra that Bobby was gone that day. She didn’t recall seeing anything unusual in the house after arriving at 8 A.M. It wasn’t until the following Tuesday, February 9, the day the Kathie story broke in all the newspapers, that she noticed something odd. It was a dried bloodstain on the front panel of the dishwasher in the kitchen. She didn’t know what to make of it. As she stared at the blood, someone knocked on the front door. It was the police. Two detectives, in suits. She said she couldn’t remember if they were NYPD or with the New York State Police. They said they had seen the newspaper stories that day and asked Liz if she’d seen anything unusual in the house. She invited them in and took them to the kitchen, pointing to the blood on the dishwasher.