Former ‘SNL’ Star Set to Testify in Robert Durst Murder Trial

Amid Robert Durst’s ongoing murder trial, former Saturday Night Live star Laraine Newman is among the prosecution witnesses to take the stand to testify. Durst stands accused of the murder of Susan Berman, Newman’s friend who was a writer and who had been close friends with Durst after they first met at UCLA. He is also suspected of murdering at least two others, including his first wife, Kathleen McCormack Durst, who disappeared in 1982.

When the trial resumed in May following a year-long delay due to the coronavirus pandemic, Deputy District Attorney John Lewin said in his updated opening statement that the cases of Kathie McCormack Durst and Berman are “interrelated.” He said throughout the trial, jurors would hear evidence that Durst killed his first wife and then used Berman to help cover up his part in the crime. Taking the witness stand for the first time on Wednesday, Newman seemed to support this claim.

Asked how she learned Kathie had disappeared, according to The Sun, she said Berman told her “that she had provided an alibi for him, for Bobby, in relation to the disappearance.” According to Newman, Berman told her “that she made a phone call.” Confirming that she was “100%” certain that Berman told her she had provided Durst with an alibi, Newman was asked if Berman indicated to her “whether or not in words whether this was an actual alibi or whether she had done something false?” The SNL alum said, “it was something false,” adding that she “responded negatively” to Berman. She said they never discussed the subject again, with Newman adding that she felt “tremendous shame that I did not appreciate the gravity of what she was telling me.”

The current trial has been years in the making. Durst was first arrested in 2015. At the time, he pled not guilty. His arrest was sparked by developments dug up by The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst, the HBO documentary series which saw Durst seemingly admitting to the crimes he was being accused of. In the final episode of the docuseries, Durst was caught on audio talking to himself in the bathroom, saying, “What the hell did I do? Killed them all, of course.” Along being suspected of Berman and Kathie’s murders, Durst is also suspected in the murder of his neighbor, Morris Black, who was killed in Texas in 2001. Durst admitted to dismembering Black’s body, though he was acquitted of the murder on the grounds of self-defense and was not charged for the dismemberment. The ongoing murder trial is for the murder of Berman. The murder charge includes the special circumstance allegation that she was killed because she witnessed a crime.