Durst, Jinx, will be tried for murder

US millionaire Robert Durst, the subject of the HBO documentary The Jinx, will be tried for the murder of a close friend in 2000, ordered a judge.

Prosecutors say Susan Berman, 75, was killed to prevent police officers from questioning her about the disappearance of his wife, Kathleen.

Mr. Durst pleaded not guilty to the murder charge.

The heir to the real estate was the subject in 2015 of a six-part television series in which he allegedly confessed to the crime.

Captured by the microphone in the finale, Mr. Durst thought to himself, "What did I do? The ones killed, of course."

A few hours before the broadcast of this latest episode, the authorities arrested him in New Orleans for the murder of Ms. Berman.

• Robert Durst: a life of violence
• Can Durst's 'confessions' be used in court?

Mr. Durst frequently interrupted Thursday's hearing, apparently heading to the nearest door in his wheelchair and inviting the court to "have a good weekend".

His lawyers argued that there was not enough reason for a lawsuit because there were no fingerprints or DNA data to establish a link between Mr. Durst and the death of Ms. Berman.

But Judge Mark Windham said the comments recorded by the show's tycoon "function as succinct confessions" of several murders, unless he can give an explanation.

Mr. Durst was acquitted of the murder of his old neighbor, Morris Black, in 2001, after claiming to have killed him for self-defense before cutting off his body.

The unresolved deaths

• Kathleen McCormack: Robert Durst's first wife disappeared in 1982 and is presumed dead
• Susan Berman: This close friend of the Durst family was killed in 2000 in the Los Angeles home
• Morris Black: Mr. Durst killed his elderly neighbor in 2001 as part of what he called self-defense during a fight for a gun. Mr. Durst's attorneys testified that he then panicked and got rid of the body – by cutting it off – and that he was acquitted

In deciding that Mr. Durst should be tried, the judge stated that he had also taken into account Mr. Durst's comments on the accuracy of his portrayal in the film All Good Things.

The fictional 2010 film, starring Ryan Gosling in a character based on Robert Durst and directed by The Jinx's filmmaker Andrew Jinecki, describes the tycoon's life and portrays him as a murderer.

Asked about it in the DVD commentary, Durst said, "I thought the film was very, very, very close to what was happening in most cases."