L.A. Times receives purported prison letter from Robert Durst

“The Jinx” may be over, but the strange saga of Robert Durst continues to play out in real time. On Thursday, Durst, who is now wanted in Los Angeles for murder in the death of his friend Susan Berman 15 years ago, pleaded not guilty to gun charges before a Louisiana judge. At the same time, the Los Angeles Times published a handwritten letter Durst purportedly sent to the paper’s Houston bureau chief.

The Times said the letter, which it has not verified as having been written by Durst, arrived Wednesday, two weeks after a reporter wrote to the now-notorious New York City real estate heir at the Elayn Hunt Correctional Center in St. Gabriel, La. Durst has been locked up there since his arrest in New Orleans last month — in a virtually made-for-TV moment that coincided with the culmination of the HBO documentary series about Durst’s life and the crimes with which he’s been linked.

While Durst’s last interview ended in an eerie, inadvertent apparent confession, this letter — if it is, in fact, written by Durst — suggests he hasn't been completely deterred from talking to the press. That is, as long as the conversation has nothing to do with his alleged crimes. The almost illegible letter includes reflections on the writer’s “part-time” life in Los Angeles from 2008 to 2011, such as the traffic on La Cienega Boulevard and his favorite coffee spot on Sunset Boulevard; his interests: “opera and pro football;” and his health.

“As my minor balance [problem] expanded into full blown hydrocephalus requiring a shunt I knew that if I was going to let some guy drill into my head there was no place I would be willing to go ahead other than the Houston medical center and I left L.A.,” the letter says.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Durst, who had been living in Houston prior to his arrest in New Orleans, had a shunt installed last year to drain hydrocephalus, or fluid on his brain. He also underwent surgery for esophageal cancer, the Times said. The letter doesn’t address Durst's alleged crimes — not Berman’s death, nor the 2001 murder and dismemberment of his Galveston, Texas, neighbor Morris Black, for which he was acquitted, nor the 1982 disappearance of his wife, Kathleen. However, it does address this omission.

“I have said nothing about the charges, crimes or trials,” the letter says. “If you decide to use any of this, which is okay, please make the above clear.”  Last month, FBI agents who had been sent to arrest Durst in relation to Berman’s 2000 murder allegedly found Durst at a New Orleans hotel, in possession of $42,000 in cash, five ounces of marijuana and a .38-caliber rifle. As a result, he was indicted in Louisiana for illegally possessing a gun (since he is a convicted felon) as well as carrying a firearm while in possession of a controlled substance — a label that still applies to marijuana in Louisiana.

The two weapons charges, to which Durst pleaded not guilty Thursday, have delayed his extradition to California, where he will face murder charges. Still, the letter suggests that its author expects to be moved to Los Angeles soon and is open to further communication with the paper.

“I’m sure you know what your abilities are to visit me when I get to L.A.,” he wrote. Source: Happy Girl