Multimillionaire Robert Durst found guilty of murdering best friend

A California jury on Friday found multimillionaire real estate heir Robert Durst guilty of murdering his best friend Susan Berman in 2000, the first homicide conviction for a man suspected of killing three people in three states over the past 39 years.

Durst, 78, was not in court for the verdict, as he was in isolation at a jail because he was exposed to someone with coronavirus. He faces up to life in prison.

The nine-woman, three-man jury deliberated for seven and a half hours over three days.

Los Angeles County prosecutors called Durst a "narcissistic psychopath" who killed Berman in an attempt to cover up the disappearance of his wife, Kathleen McCormack Durst, in New York in 1982.

Durst was only on trial for killing Berman in California, but prosecutors argued he murdered three people: his missing wife, Berman and a neighbour in Texas who discovered his identity at a time when Durst was hiding from the law.

Despite long being a suspect in the disappearance of his wife, a 29-year-old medical student, Durst was never charged. Prosecutors said he killed her and then decided to kill Berman 18 years later because she had told others that she helped Durst cover up the crime.

Defence lawyers in turn portrayed Durst, a frail cancer survivor who uses a wheelchair, as a "sick old man," referencing Durst's claim he is on the autism spectrum. They noted prosecutors, who questioned him for nine days of cross examination, were unable to produce forensic evidence linking Durst to the murder of Berman, 55, who was shot in the back of her head inside her Beverly Hills home.