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'The Evidence Is Overwhelming’: Family Of Kathleen McCormack Durst Asks That Criminal Charges Be Brought Against Robert Durst
“Kathie is still waiting for justice,” Kathleen McCormack’s family said in a statement.
Kathleen McCormack Durst’s family is now calling on prosecutors in New York to charge Robert Durst following his murder conviction in California last week in the killing of Susan Berman.
McCormack Durst’s loved ones issued a statement following Friday’s ruling, urging the Westchester District Attorney’s Office to bring additional charges against Durst for her 1982 death, asking them to “do the right thing."
“Not a single day goes by that we do not think about our beautiful, smart, and kind sister, Kathleen,” her family wrote in a statement, News 12 reported. “Today, more than ever before, it is clear that she was murdered by Robert Durst in Westchester County, New York on January 31, 1982. The evidence is overwhelming. Although Durst has now been rightly convicted of killing Susan Berman, who helped him conceal the truth about Kathie’s death, the McCormack family is still waiting for justice. Kathie is still waiting for justice.”
The statement blasted Robert Durst’s conviction as bizarre and unacceptable that he stood trial for murdering an accomplice in his wife's death before “being held accountable for Kathie’s murder.”
“The justice system in Los Angeles has finally served the Berman family,” the statement added. “It is now time for Westchester to do the same for the McCormack family and charge Durst for the murder of his wife, Kathie, which occurred almost 40 years ago. Westchester DA Rocah has assembled a team of cold case prosecutors and investigators every bit the equal of those in Los Angeles. It is time for Westchester to finally do the right thing.”
McCormack Durst's body was never recovered in 2017; she was declared legally dead.
This month, Durst testified he’d misled investigators in 1982 regarding his wife’s disappearance. The real estate scion told jurors he’d lied about a phone conversation he supposedly had with his wife the night she was last seen alive.
“That was a lie,” Durst told the court. “I wanted to convince [the detective] that Kathie had gotten back.”
In May, the Westchester District Attorney’s Office announced they’d reopened the investigation into McCormack Durst's disappearance. The investigation remains active, a spokesperson for the office confirmed Tuesday.
“The Westchester District Attorney’s Office commends all of those involved in persuading a California jury to hold Robert Durst accountable for the murder of Susan Berman,” Westchester District Attorney Mimi Rocah said in a statement sent to Oxygen.com. “Our independent investigation, which District Attorney Rocah re-opened shortly after she took office into Kathie Durst’s death, remains ongoing and we will have no further comment at this time.”
On Sept. 17, Durst was found guilty of the murder of Berman, more than 20 years after she was slain. A jury concluded Durst was lying in wait prior to fatally shooting the California journalist in Beverly Hills in 2000.
From the trial’s early stages, prosecutors insisted McCormack Durst’s killing later triggered the murder of Berman and after that, the murder of Morris Black in 2001. Durst testified earlier this month about using a saw to drunkenly dismember Black after he had shot him after Black had learned his true identity while he was hiding out in Texas.
Durst was acquitted of Black’s murder in 2003, though he ultimately was convicted of tampering with evidence.
Durst also testified this month he’d carried out the killings because he was afraid then-Westchester District Attorney Jeanine Pirro, who is now a Fox News host, was investigating him.
“I was hiding from Jeanine Pirro,” Durst told the court.
Deputy District Attorney John Lewin described Durst as a “narcissistic psychopath” during closing arguments.
