A ‘Full-Service Law Firm’: Robert Durst’s Masked and Face-Shielded Lawyers Bizarrely Reenact Morris Black Shooting on Courtroom Floor – By Alberto Luperon (Law and Crime) / Aug 16 2021
Though infamous defendant Robert Durst, 78, is only on trial for murdering friend Susan Berman, 55, two other deaths are inextricably linked to his case. That played out in bizarre fashion on Monday when Durst’s attorneys used the courtroom floor to reenact their client’s version of how he killed neighbor Morris Black, 73, in 2001.
Perhaps it is natural that audience members giggled at the sight of lawyer Dick DeGuerin (as Durst) and co-counsel David Chesnoff (as Black) playing out the struggle. As Durst previously testified in his 2003 trial in Texas, he claimed that Black took Durst’s gun from its storage place in the oven. Black pointed the gun at him, he said. This sparked a struggle over the gun. They tripped and fell. The gun went off, striking Black in the head, according to this version of events.
Jurors in Texas ultimately acquitted Durst of murdering Black, but they did find him of guilty of dismembering Black’s body. Authorities never found Black’s head. DeGuerin represented Durst at that trial.
Quite a few in the courtroom found amusement from the grim reenactment on Monday.
“This is my favorite part of the whole trial so far,” said Judge Mark Windham, among other jokes.
