Updated, March 16th, 7:30 a.m. PT:
Robert Durst, subject of the HBO docuseries “The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst,” confessed to three murders during the finale that aired Sunday.
“There it is. You’re caught,” the real estate heir said. “What the hell did I do? Killed them all, of course.”
Durst was not on camera when he made the admission. Filmmaker Andrew Jarecki said Durst left his microphone on, and was talking to himself in the bathroom. It’s not clear if Jarecki or anybody else involved in the project confronted Durst about the audio.
Durst’s confession came after he was asked about handwriting similarities in a letter he wrote, and another linked to the death of his friend, Susan Berman, who was shot to death inside her home in the Benedict Canyon area of Los Angeles in 2000.
Durst has previously denied involvement in Berman’s death, as well as the 1982 disappearance of his wife, Kathleen, and the 2001 murder of his Texas neighbor, Morris Black.
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Robert Durst, subject of the HBO series “The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst,” has been arrested in New Orleans on murder charges, his attorney said Sunday.
The real estate heir (shown above in a booking photo) was taken into custody Saturday at 10:59 p.m., the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office wrote on its website.
The arrest came one day before the final episode of the HBO series was set to air, and Durst is being held on a first degree murder warrant out of Los Angeles County.
Durst’s attorney, Chip Lewis, told Houston television station KTRK-TV that his client will not fight extradition, although he said Durst does plan to vigorously fight the charges in Los Angeles.
“The Jinx” centers on Durst’s suspected involvement in three murders.
In 1982, his first wife Kathleen disappeared. Some insiders believed Durst’s friend, Susan Berman, knew about his wife’s disappearance.
But in 2000, Berman was shot to death inside her home in the Benedict Canyon area of Los Angeles.
Durst spoke at length about the case on “The Jinx” and now faces a reopened investigation in L.A. into Berman’s death.
The show featured a never-before-seen letter discovered by Berman’s stepson Sareb Kaufman. Kaufman said the letter, which he believes Durst sent to Berman a year before her death, carried similarities to an anonymous note sent to police the day Berman died, a letter authorities say only Berman’s killer could have written.
Durst has denied killing Berman, but police have long believed he had a motive, allegedly wanting to silence her about Kathleen’s disappearance, another alleged crime he has long been suspected of but never been charged.
Durst has said he has no idea what happened to her either.
He was also charged in the 2001 shooting death and dismemberment of a neighbor in Galveston, Texas, but he claimed self-defense and was later acquitted.
Following Durst’s arrest, HBO said in a statement, “We simply cannot say enough about the brilliant job that Andrew Jarecki and Marc Smerling did in producing ‘The Jinx.’ Years in the making, their thorough research and dogged reporting reignited interest in Robert Durst’s story with the public and law enforcement.”