‘The Jinx’ Director Feared for His Security Earlier than Robert Durst Arrest

[This story contains some spoilers from the premiere of The Jinx — Part Two.]

When talking not too long ago in regards to the exceptional sequence of occasions that led to Robert Durst‘s arrest in the future earlier than The Jinx aired its season one finale in 2015, the filmmakers behind The Jinx — Half Two, which premiered its six-episode follow-up on Sunday, revealed that director Andrew Jarecki knew from the FBI when Durst went on the run.

“Andrew knew that he was already on the run as a result of there was some speak about some private hazard that Andrew was in,” government producer Zac Stuart-Pontier instructed The Hollywood Reporter. “So, he did know that for these 4 or 5 days that [Durst] was on the run. However this was not frequent data.”

Jarecki acknowledged there was confusion about what the general public knew on the time, together with when the filmmakers submitted proof for the police investigation into Durst for the 2000 homicide of his shut buddy, Susan Berman. The Jinx — Half Two defined through a title card that the filmmakers first handed over proof in 2013, years earlier than the present premiered. The filmmakers additionally not too long ago spoke about how they found Durst’s stunning toilet audio confession two years after they’d filmed it, and handed that over as nicely.

“The typical individual thinks, ‘Properly, if in case you have proof of a homicide, after all the police will exit and arrest the man.’ And we thought that, too,” Jarecki not too long ago instructed THR. “After which after we met with [L.A. deputy district attorney] John Lewin [who appears in Part Two], he stated, ‘Simply to let you realize, these [cold] circumstances normally take me 5 years.’ We’re like, ‘This man has positively murdered three folks already. It’s very doable he’ll do it once more. It’s doable I’ll be certainly one of them.’ And he stated, ‘Properly, the worst factor you are able to do, if you’re a district lawyer’s workplace, is convey a prosecution earlier than you’re prepared … Should you’re going to do it, you gotta take him down.’”

Within the newest episode for his or her Official Jinx Podcast for HBO, Jarecki and Stuart-Pontier delved deeper into how Jarecki feared for his security earlier than Durst was in the end apprehended in New Orleans, the place he would then be extradited to California and finally tried and convicted for the first-degree homicide of Berman.

The Jinx — Half Two premiere had uncovered the parallel occasions of Durst occurring the run whereas the primary season, The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst, was airing weekly in February and March of 2015. Durst packed his baggage after watching in actual time the penultimate fifth episode, which revealed that Durst’s handwriting matched that of the “cadaver notice” believed to have been written by Berman’s assassin.

“We had a friendship of kinds,” defined Jarecki within the podcast.

Durst had famously reached out to the filmmaker after he was impressed with the function movie Jarecki directed based mostly on Durst’s life, 2010’s All Good Issues, and was then voluntarily interviewed over the course of 21 hours for the primary season of The Jinx.

“It was not a standard friendship, it was not one thing that both of us anticipated,” he continued, “however we have been thrown collectively on this bizarre manner. After which we spent a whole lot of time collectively and talked and had a whole lot of conversations. I believe Bob is determining that, beginning with episode 4, possibly we’re not pals anymore. After which episode 5, we’re positively not pals.”

The Jinx — Half Two took viewers by means of Durst’s steps as soon as he started to flee. However the sequence didn’t contact on Jarecki’s conversations with the FBI at the moment, which he revealed within the podcast.

“I stated to them, ‘I believe there’s a danger to me. And I’m okay with that, however I’d prefer to have a plan in place if something bizarre occurs,’” Jarecki recalled. “After which I bear in mind calling up my man and having him say, ‘Yeah, we actually don’t know the place he’s.’ And I stated, ‘Properly, how’s that doable? You’re the FBI, proper? You’re the Federal Bureau of Investigation. You have to be the boss of the place persons are, particularly in the event that they’re placing witnesses in danger or no matter.’ And he stated, ‘Properly, you realize, I’ll hold you posted if we discover something.’ In order that was not confidence inspiring.”

Stuart-Pontier stated that Jarecki employed safety to guard himself and his household as a precaution whereas Los Angeles detectives have been at Durst’s empty condo in Houston attempting to piece collectively his actions. Durst, who would go on to show off his mobile phone and use the alias Everett Ward, by no means returned to that condo.

“My daughter was fairly younger on the time, possibly she was 11, and I bear in mind saying form of nonchalantly, ‘Hey, uh, tomorrow morning after I take you to highschool, we’re going to have a few different guys, you realize, serving to me take you to highschool.’ And he or she instantly began crying. And I believed, all proper, nicely, she will get it. Perhaps I ought to take this severely,” stated Jarecki.

The FBI had a wiretap on Durst’s cellphone and days later, the day earlier than the Jinx half one finale, March 15, 2015, they heard Durst attempting to log into his voicemail and have been in a position to hint him to the Marriott Lodge in New Orleans the place he was apprehended.

Within the podcast, Jarecki defined why Durst selected Everett Ward as his alias.

“The title Everett Ward got here to Bob as a result of he remembered it because the title of one other man who had purchased a bow noticed at Chalmers {Hardware}. There had been two bow saws purchased round that point. One is the one which Bob purchased, with a purpose to use it to dismember Morris Black, and the opposite one was a bow noticed purchased by a man named Everett Ward,” stated the director.

When The Jinx premiered, Durst was launched as a New York actual property inheritor who had been suspected of three murders, however by no means convicted: his first spouse, Kathleen McCormack Durst, who disappeared in 1982; his shut buddy Berman, who was shot useless execution-style in December 2000; and his neighbor Morris Black, whom he dismembered however was acquitted of murdering, claiming self-defense, in 2001.

When Durst was arrested, he was discovered with greater than $40,000, a loaded firearm, a map of Cuba and a “lifelike flesh-colored masks” that Durst had commissioned to make use of as a disguise. Within the proof room, the filmmakers have been capable of finding a contact for the masks maker. They used the masks within the recreations proven in The Jinx — Half Two.

“It was actually spooky since you may put a hat on and you possibly can stroll round, and I believe the crew wouldn’t essentially know that that was an individual carrying a masks,” stated Jarecki. “Should you get proper up near it, you’d say, ‘that face is transferring weirdly,’ nevertheless it was fairly scary to see that you possibly can simply see any person strolling by means of Grand Central carrying a masks like that, and also you in all probability wouldn’t discover it.”

Within the podcast, the filmmakers additionally performed extra of the tapes from Lewin’s questioning of Durst following the arrest, together with Durst’s declare that he was on methamphetamine throughout his Jinx interviews. Each Jarecki and Stuart-Pontier instructed THR that they didn’t consider that Durst was on medication, noting that Lewin merely instructed Durst that declare was “bullshit.”

“He likes to smoke weed. It’s not not possible that he took a success on his manner over. He’s a wake-and-bake sort of man. So, is it doable that early on he was stoned? Just a little. Perhaps,” Stuart-Pontier had instructed THR. “However the man spends his complete life stoned, so I don’t understand how a lot that affected him. Past that, I believe we’d have recognized. He was completely with it. He was getting up, he was transferring round. He was interacting with folks. He’s a weirdo, however I don’t consider he was on medication.”

Whereas he was jailed in New Orleans and awaiting extradition, Jarecki additionally revealed on the podcast that he tried to go see Durst.

“I felt like if Bob wished to inform any extra of his story, he was going to inform it to me, proper?’” stated Jarecki. “We did have a shorthand and I did suppose that there’s a fairly good likelihood that he was going to plead responsible. And I believed, nicely, if he desires to unburden himself, or one thing, I’ve a accountability to be there. It’ll be fascinating to be there. I simply wish to hear what he has to say at this level.”

Jarecki wrote a letter to Durst, which he learn on the podcast. (One line learn: “The Bob Durst phenomenon has develop into an actual cultural touchstone.”) When he arrived on the St. Charles Parish Correctional Middle in New Orleans, he was instructed Durst was “out.” So Jarecki waited till a corrections van pulled up and Durst walked out.

“I felt a bit of unhappy for him in that second,” he stated of their encounter. “I take a look at him and he seems at me and I take a look at him and he’s form of within the shadow and I’m within the vibrant daylight. And he didn’t say something. After which he simply sort of resumed his trudge into the jail.”

As soon as inside, Durst ended up declining the go to.

“I wasn’t shocked when [the woman at the visitor counter] stated that. However it was a bit of bit unhappy simply because I believed there was likelihood that in that second, Bob may simply say, ‘Properly, I’m tremendous bored right here. This can be a horrible place for me to be. And this man had lots to do with getting me right here. Perhaps I’ll see what he has to say for himself,” stated Jarecki.

Later, Jarecki heard Durst talking in recorded jail conversations about his tried go to.

“His perspective, to me, appeared, um, sensible alecky,” Durst is heard saying in a recorded name. “Right here is that this sensible alecky man saying, ‘You realize, I actually fucked you.’ … Inflicting me to go to jail, very presumably, inflicting me to die in jail and I’m speculated to wish to speak to him about it.”

Durst continued, “I can see it being guilt for him… the Jarecki stuff makes me really feel like a deer or rabbit that’s being hunted nevertheless it doesn’t understand it’s being hunted and it’s serving to the hunters.”

In response to listening to these feedback, Jarecki stated, “He says that when he thinks about The Jinx, he realizes that he didn’t perceive what was taking place. He didn’t perceive the jeopardy that he was placing himself in. As a result of he doesn’t know he’s being hunted. And that’s a really sort of chilling idea.”

In September 2021, Durst was convicted of Berman’s homicide, together with the particular circumstance that he killed her as a witness due to what she may reveal about what occurred to Durst’s first spouse, Kathie, whose physique was by no means discovered. He was sentenced to life in jail with out the potential for parole. Two months later, he was indicted on the cost of second-degree homicide in Kathie’s killing. Nevertheless, he died whereas in custody of the California Division of Correction, in January 2022, at age 78 earlier than a trial may start.

The Jinx — Half Two releases new episodes Sundays. Hearken to the official HBO podcast right here.