DURST APPEARS IN NEW ORLEANS COURT; POLICE SAY HE HAD A REVOLVER WITH HIM WHEN ARRESTED

Millionaire Robert Durst agreed Monday (16 MARCH 2015) to return to Los Angeles to face a 15-year-old murder charge after muttering that he "killed them all" in a documentary about his links to three sensational killings.

Robert Durst, 71, appeared before a judge in New Orleans after FBI agents arrested him before HBO's broadcast of Sunday's final episode of the documentary.

He is charged in the shooting death of Susan Berman, a mobster's daughter who acted as his spokeswoman. He has also long been suspected in the death of his wife, Kathleen Durst, and was acquitted years ago in the death of an elderly neighbor.

In the finale of the documentary that authorities hope will finally lead to a conviction, he muttered that "killed them all, of course."

He shuffled into the courtroom with his hands shackled at his waist, wearing sandals and an orange jumpsuit. He turned to the gallery and smiled, then appeared to fall asleep just before the hearing started. Later, he answered "yes" to questions from the judge about whether he was waiving extradition from Louisiana state to California.

But one of his lawyers, Dick DeGuerin, said the trip may be delayed because New Orleans prosecutors are considering other unspecified charges. He wouldn't elaborate, and spokesman Christopher Bowman said the Orleans Parish district attorney's office won't comment.

A police report said Durst was in possession of a revolver when he was arrested. In Louisiana, a person needs a permit to carry a concealed weapon, and it was not immediately clear if Durst had a permit.

A former prosecutor who reopened one of the cold cases against Durst years ago, Jeanine Pirro, said Monday that his own words, recorded during and after a lengthy interview he gave to the filmmaker, are enough to convict him.

In the finale of "The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst," Durst acknowledges similarities in the handwriting of a letter he wrote and another one sent anonymously to Beverly Hills Police alerting them to his friend's "cadaver." Then he went to the bathroom, still wearing his live microphone.

What followed was bizarre rambling in which Durst said, apparently to himself, "There it is. You're caught" and "What the hell did I do? Killed them all of course."

Jarecki and his co-writer and cinematographer Marc Smerling answered some of the many questions raised by Durst's audiotaped comments in a New York Times interview published Monday.

They said they never confronted Durst about what he said in the bathroom, but that they did share what they found with authorities last year as they were preparing the film to be aired.

Durst willingly talked with Jarecki on camera. They met after the filmmaker told a fictionalized account of Durst's story in "All Good Things," a 2010 film starring Ryan Gosling.

The making of the documentary took three years, and the bathroom audio was discovered by an editing crew last June, Jarecki said.

For the filmmakers, the audiotape tipped the scales - they not only believe he's responsible for the murders, but that he's capable of more violence. Jarecki told the Times that they hired security and were relieved when Durst was finally arrested.

Berman was the daughter of an associate of Las Vegas mobsters Bugsy Siegel and Meyer Lansky who spoke out on Durst's behalf after his wife disappeared. She was killed at her home near Beverly Hills with a bullet to the back of her head.

Durst then lived as a mute woman in a Texas boarding house until 2001, when dismembered parts of Black's body were found floating in Galveston Bay. He fled house arrest, then turned up shoplifting in Pennsylvania.

Lewis told that jury that Durst shot Black in self-defense, and he was acquitted of murder, despite admitting that he dismembered Black's body.

AP Television

New Orleans, March 16, 2015

1. Various of attorneys for Robert Durst leaving the Orleans Parish Criminal District Court

2. SOUNDBITE Dick DeGuerin, Attorney for Robert Durst:

"let me just say that we came here to waive jurisdiction and go back to California and get it on. Bob Durst didn't kill Susan Berman. He's ready to end all the rumor and speculation and have a trial. But we were frustrated because local authorities are considering filing charges on him here and holding him here. We're ready to go to California and have a trial. See you later."

3. Various of who is believed to be Robert Durst arriving by sheriff's vehicle transport at a secure back entrance to the Orleans Parish criminal courthouse complex, which is next to the Orleans Parish jail

4. Various exteriors of the Orleans Parish Criminal District Court

Ellen Strauss, a friend of millionaire Robert Durst's first wife Kathleen Durst, said she is "over the moon" about his arrest.

Strauss has been investigating the death of her friend for over 30 years and feels vindicated by Durst's arrest.

"I will take his going to jail anyway I can, I'm not fussy, he can only go to jail once. What I would like is for him to tell us, on his death bed if he has to, where he put Kathy's body or pieces of it," said Strauss.

Strauss said she has spoken to Kathleen Durst's family and said they are "very happy" with the arrest.

"They've finally seen an end to it. You know she has a mother that's 101-years old living at home, 101 and not knowing for the last 33 years where her daughter is," said Strauss.

Durst was charged Monday in Los Angeles with first-degree murder in the shooting of Susan Berman, the daughter of a prominent Las Vegas mobster. Durst has also been suspected _ but never charged _ in the disappearance of his first wife in New York.

He could face the death penalty under special circumstances that allege he ambushed Berman and murdered a witness to a crime.

Authorities found more than a quarter-pound of marijuana and a revolver in Durst's hotel room when he was arrested over the weekend, a prosecutor said Tuesday.

Durst appeared before a judge for a second straight day on Tuesday to face the drug and weapons charges.

In 2003, he was acquitted of murder in a dismemberment death in Texas.

In a documentary that just wrapped up about Durst's troubled life, he mumbled about how he "killed them all," providing a dramatic kick to the end of the series. But a law enforcement official said his arrest on the murder charge was based on words he wrote.

Analysis linked a letter Durst wrote to his friend Susan Berman a year before her killing with one that pointed police to her body, and that was the key new evidence in the long-dormant investigation into the 2000 killing, the official not authorized to speak publicly told The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity because the investigation was ongoing.

AP TELEVISION

New York - March 17, 2015

1. Ellen Strauss, friend of Kathleen Durst

2. SOUNDBITE (English) Ellen Strauss, friend of Kathleen Durst:

"I'm over the moon, absolutely over the moon. That's why I agree to do all these interviews, I'm exhausted. I wish my friend Eleanor Schwank, who worked with me on this, who just passed away could see it."

3. Ellen Strauss, friend of Kathleen Durst

4. SOUNDBITE (English) Ellen Strauss, friend of Kathleen Durst:

"I will take his going to jail anyway I can, I'm not fussy, he can only go to jail once. What I would like is for him to tell us, on his death bed if he has to, where he put Kathy's body or pieces of it."

5. Ellen Strauss, Friend of Kathleen Durst

6. SOUNDBITE (English) Ellen Strauss, friend of Kathleen Durst:

"They're very happy. They've finally seen an end to it. You know she has a mother that's 101 years old living at home, 101 and not knowing for the last 33 years where her daughter is."

7. Ellen Strauss, Friend of Kathleen Durst

8. SOUNDBITE (English) Ellen Strauss, friend of Kathleen Durst:

"I haven't thought that far ahead, I mean I don't expect he is going to get off scot-free, I really don't. I think this time we've got him. He stabbed himself. He hoisted himself on his own petard whatever you want to call it. I am not thinking that way at all. I really think this time we've got him."

9. Ellen Strauss, friend of Kathleen Durst, walking outside

10. SOUNDBITE (English) Ellen Strauss, friend of Kathleen Durst:

"I think the trial is another chapter. I mean I'm waiting for that to be the nail in his coffin. He's got to squeak out of this one, that would be really amazing."

11. SOUNDBITE (English) Ellen Strauss, friend of Kathleen Durst:

"How hard everybody worked, how hard all of us worked and it now seems that maybe it paid off, that it did pay off. I know that that the last chapter isn't written yet, but that is what life is all about surprises."

12. Ellen Strauss, friend of Kathleen Durst:

SHOTLIST:

1. Wide of clock

2. Close-up of clock digits

3. Set-up shot of granddaughter of debt clock inventor Helena Durst

4. SOUNDBITE: (English) Helena Durst, granddaughter of debt clock inventor:

"If you notice the dollar sign, we actually had to add a dollar sign and a one. It looks a little bit squished together. We had to squeeze everything together."

5. Close of clock

6. SOUNDBITE: (English) Helena Durst, granddaughter of debt clock inventor:

"And also highlight the amount of debt that each child is born into this nation which is about 30-thousand dollars"

7. People walking

8. SOUNDBITE: (English) Catherine Jones, Vox pop:

"It's pretty scary, it's a pretty big number."

9. Close of clock

10. SOUNDBITE: (English) Avi Goldenberg, Vox pop:

"I think we'll be able to handle it, we've got a strong economy, we'll walk through it, just got to have a strong stomach, steel up."

11. Pan from Internal Revenue Service building to clock

12. SOUNDBITE: (English) William Grams, Vox pop:

"I'm starting to wonder when we're going to start questioning the US government's credit rating. And you know the Federal Reserve's balance sheet is going to be just as risky as all the banks they're saving because they're taking on all this stuff."

13. Close-up of clock

STORYLINE:

In a sign of the times, the National Debt Clock in New York City has run out of digits to record the growing figure.

As a short-term fix, the digital dollar sign on the billboard-style clock near Times Square has been switched to a figure - the "1" in 10 (tr) trillion US dollars.

It's marking the federal government's current debt at about 10.2 (tr) trillion US dollars.

The Durst Organisation says it plans to update the sign next year by adding two digits.

That will make it capable of tracking debt up to a quadrillion dollars.

The late Manhattan real estate developer Seymour Durst put the sign up in 1989 to call attention to what was then a 2.7 (tr) trillion US dollars debt.

Helena Durst, the inventor's granddaughter, explains the recent modifications: "if you notice the dollar sign. We actually had to add a dollar sign and a one. It looks a little bit squished together. We had to squeeze everything together."

The clock was briefly retired, for two years, from 2000 to 2002, because the clock couldn't display a declining number.

SHOTLIST

1. Various wide shots of warehouse containing drug tunnel

2. Close of armed Federal Agents

3. Mid of entrance to area of warehouse where drug tunnel was found

4. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent climbing down into tunnel entrance

5. Agent pointing out hydraulic buttons that open door of tunnel

6. Various of tools and shovels used to dig tunnel

7. Mid of monitor showing night vision image of tunnel below, panning to ICE agent preparing to climbing down hole

8. Mid of tunnel, following ICE agent

9. ICE agent Bob (no last name given), showing stairs built in tunnel

10. SOUNDBITE (English) Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent:

"This is the stair system, it's about a 70 foot drop. And you can see where they cut the stairs out, obviously coming up. And this is how they get from the level of the tunnel and the rail up into the level just underneath ground level."

11. Tracking shot following ICE agent climbing up stairs in tunnel

12. Various of tunnel

13. Various of rail track and electrical cables in tunnel

14. Various of entrance to tunnel

15. SOUNDBITE (English): Tim Durst, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent:

"To an extent this is somewhat of a cat and mouse game. As long as there's demand for the supply of drugs in the United States then the drug smuggling organisations will continue to find a way to smuggle drugs into the United States."

16. Mid of monitor showing night vision image in tunnel

17. Mid of night vision camera in tunnel

18. Tracking shot of ICE agent climbing back toward entrance

19. SOUNDBITE (English) Tim Durst, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent:

"They're looking to find new ways to move drugs and we're looking to find the ways that they're moving drugs. Their hope is they get a tunnel completed, they can move a lot of drugs into the United States and get a good return on their investment. Our hope is we find tunnels or the boats or whatever next they're next going to before they get a return on their investment."

20. Tunnel Task Force members from ICE, DEA and Border Patrol entering border warehouse

21. Tracking shot of agents walking through business

22. Mid of ICE agent "Ryan" interviewing business owner, Ron Soto

23. SOUNDBITE (English) Ron Soto, Warehouse Business Owner:

"The last tunnel that was found was next to one of my associates and he was shocked. There was nothing that he could have noticed before or made him think there was something going on."

24. Wide of border fence by warehouse complex, panning back to wide of warehouses

STORYLINE:

US federal authorities were on Thursday knocking on doors and asking for help from warehouse owners and tenants close to the border with Mexico after two major underground passages were discovered last month.

The cross-border tunnels - housed in warehouses in San Diego's Otay Mesa industrial area - were used to smuggle huge amounts of drugs from Tijuana, Mexico, according to the authorities.

Agents hope to learn more about the 12-thousand businesses that occupy Otay Mesa's non-descript warehouses and low-slung office parks near one of nation's busiest border crossings for cargo.

The streets hum with cargo trucks by day and fall silent on nights and weekends.

An Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent who visited two offices on Thursday peppered managers with questions before asking to look around: What line of work are you in? Who is your landlord? How many neighbouring suites are leased?

The tunnels discovered last month ran about 2,000 feet (600 metres) and were equipped with rail car, lighting and ventilation systems.

According to US authorities, both were the work of Mexico's Sinaloa cartel, headed by that country's most-wanted drug lord, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman.

The discoveries produced some of the largest marijuana seizures in the United States.

A passage discovered on 2 November (2010) which ran between warehouses in Tijuana and San Diego resulted in seizures of 30 tonnes on both sides of the border.

A tunnel found on Thanksgiving Day which ran from a Tijuana home to two San Diego warehouses produced seizures of more than 20 tonnes on both sides of the border.

Outlets for the tunnel found last week were in bustling office parks, only 800 feet (245 metres) a part.