Bierenbaum, a former plastic surgeon, was convicted of killing his first wife, Gail Katz, in 1985. Medical Examiner's Testimony and Videotaped Demonstration. Later the same day, around 6:30 P.M., defendant arrived alone at his sister's Montclair, New Jersey, home for his nephew's birthday party. Gail Katz is pictured in a family photo. Defendant was pretty surprised and stunned and asked her what she knew. Defendant also disputes the instructions' adequacy, and, beyond that-in addition to urging this Court to reject the notion of a background exception to the hearsay rule-he further argues that the testimony recounting the victim's out-of-court statements was largely unreliable. Has Gail Katz's Body Been Found? Update - The Cinemaholic Inmate Name BIERENBAUM, ROBERT Sex MALE Date of Birth 07/22/1955 Race / Ethnicity WHITE Custody Status IN CUSTODY Housing / Releasing Facility ATTICA Date Received (Original) 12/22/2000 Date Received (Current) 12/22/2000 Admission Type NEW COMMITMENT County of Commitment NEW YORK Crimes of Conviction Crime: Defendant contends that the court improperly allowed the prosecution to adduce testimony, and otherwise refer to evidence, that defendant was violent, and that he choked his wife to the point of unconsciousness in late 1983. Contact us. The existence of a physical shock or trauma has often been cited as a key consideration (see People v. Brooks, 71 N.Y.2d 877, 527 N.Y.S.2d 753, 522 N.E.2d 1051; People v. Brown, 70 N.Y.2d at 516-517, 522 N.Y.S.2d 837, 517 N.E.2d 515;6 Wigmore, Evidence 1745[1] [Chadbourn rev. Indeed, it has also been held that such evidence in like contexts is highly probative of the defendant's motive and [i]s either directly related to or inextricably interwoven (People v. Ely, [68 N.Y.2d 520] at 529 [510 N.Y.S.2d 532, 503 N.E.2d 88]) with the issue of his identity as the killer (People v. Linton, 166 A.D.2d 670, 671, 561 N.Y.S.2d 259, lv. Early in that period, before they began dating, and therefore significantly before the end of September, he falsely told her the police had searched his apartment and car and found him to be clean. Furthermore, she testified that, during that early period, he expressed no concern about his wife's disappearance. Therefore, the trial justice's ruling was a careful and completely reasonable exercise of judicial discretion. Bierenbaum had been out on $500,000 bail. He also gave inconsistent statements about his wifes disappearance to various women he dated after Katz vanished. They could find no proof, however, that he had harmed his wife. That logic, which correctly served to preclude the doctors from testifying to the information they conveyed to and received from the family, does not apply to the existence and nature of the psychiatrist's letter whose separate purpose was only to warn a third party, this victim. Armed with circled apartment rental ads the day before she disappeared, the victim declared to her close friend, Denise Kasenbaum, that she was leaving defendant that weekend. PEOPLE v. BIERENBAUM (2002) | FindLaw Sentenced to 20 years to life after his October 2000 conviction, Bierenbaum became eligible for parole in 2020. They also manifest his motives to abuse and control her, to quickly end a miserable marriage, and ultimately to keep her from using the Tarasoff letter in a divorce proceeding to humiliate him, damage his reputation, imperil his career and jeopardize his financial future. denied 95 N.Y.2d 792, 711 N.Y.S.2d 160, 733 N.E.2d 232; People v. Valez, 256 A.D.2d 135, 682 N.Y.S.2d 162, lv. The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent, v. Robert BIERENBAUM, Defendant-Appellant. I opened the door and then took her body out of the airplane over the ocean, the transcript reads, according to ABC News. It is clear to us that the highly probative nature of this particular proof on the critical questions of defendant's motive and intent, and of the killer's identity, far outweighs any prejudice (see People v. Alvino, 71 N.Y.2d 233, 241-242, 525 N.Y.S.2d 7, 519 N.E.2d 808). rendered November 29, 2000, affirmed. O'Malley inquiring how the investigation was proceeding and met with him on July 13. Finally, the court's cautionary instructions to the jury were more than adequate to assure a relevant and fair consideration of this evidence and avoid prejudicial impact. https://t.co/ZGewROXCaQ pic.twitter.com/qwTytMjU2s. The People proved beyond a reasonable doubt that this defendant had the opportunity, the motive, and the intent to kill his victim, and that it was he who did so. Defendant called a number of the deceased's friends voicing expressions of concern that she may have harmed herself, specifically attributing that notion to comments made to him by her therapist, Dr. Sybil Baran. 3139, 111 L.Ed.2d 638; Dutton v. Evans, 400 U.S. 74, 89, 91 S.Ct. Bierenbaum, a former plastic surgeon, was convicted of killing his first wife, Gail Katz, in 1985. As discussed at greater length elsewhere in this opinion, notwithstanding defendant's contentions to the contrary, this evidence is clearly relevant not only to motive, but to intent and identity. Defendant offered that Gail had, years earlier, attempted suicide. This station is part of Cox Media Group Television. She wanted to cool off and he waited a couple of hours and then he went looking for her and he found the towel and the suntan lotion but she was gone. Also, shortly after she vanished, he told his Southampton summer landlord that after his wife left he went through her drawers and found cocaine, prompting him to believe she went off with drug dealers. bierenbaum parole 2020 Of California, 17 Cal.3d 425, 131 Cal.Rptr. Ex-surgeon confesses to killing wife, throwing her body out of While married to defendant, the victim had an affair with at least one other man; just before the day she disappeared she stated to a friend she was about to tell defendant she wanted a divorce; she had borrowed money to prepare to leave; she said she was seeing one or two other men and that she loved one of them; she was looking for an apartment and was seen with circled newspaper ads for apartment rentals the day before she disappeared and her friend had offered her a place in Connecticut to stay while she got herself resettled. He told her of the argument and that the victim had left for Central Park with a blanket for sunbathing. Second, if we were to reach the merits, we would find that the prosecutor's summation arguments on the subject, when viewed in the complete context of his closing statements, do not warrant reversal. examined; After Murder Verdict, Town Questions Doctor He is now eligible for parole and faces a parole hearing in November. Finally, she observed that defendant was meticulous, even compulsive, about making flight log entries. Courts have also considered the status or relationship to the declarant of the person to whom the statement was made *** whether there was a coercive atmosphere, whether it was made in response to questioning and whether the statements reflect an attempt to shift blame or curry favor (James, supra, 93 N.Y.2d at 642-643, 695 N.Y.S.2d 715, 717 N.E.2d 1052 [citing United U.S. v. Matthews, 20 F.3d 538, 546; other citations omitted]). We hold that the reliability of this evidence, initially a question for the court to resolve, is amply supported by this record. Dalsass he would respond to his request to view the apartment, defendant in fact did not contact Dalsass until September 12, 1985, and he did not permit entry until September 30. 14, 551 P.2d 334). During the first police interview of defendant on July 8 at 9:00 P.M., lasting 45 minutes, Det. However, the trial justice specifically stated her ruling did not apply to preclude the letter's existence and nature. Applying these principles to the evidence in this purely circumstantial murder case, our review convinces us that, notwithstanding the facial attractiveness of some of the factual arguments defendant's appellate counsel presents, this guilty verdict, based on the proof this jury heard and saw, is the only fair and reasonable outcome (see People v. Sanchez, 61 N.Y.2d 1022, 1024, 475 N.Y.S.2d 376, 463 N.E.2d 1228). Furthermore, on July 14, while with his wife's friend Maryann DeCesare and a group of friends who were searching for her and posting missing person signs in Central Park and elsewhere, defendant quipped that he thought his wife-who was missing for a full week-was on a shopping spree at Bloomingdale's, adding, You know what a JAP1 she was. When the search party returned to the marital apartment-only seven days after his wife's disappearance-defendant volunteered to his mother-in-law, in DeCesare's presence, I wonder why the cat got sick. Her body has never 14, 551 P.2d 334; Berry v. Moench, 8 Utah 2d 191, 331 P.2d 814; Simonsen v. Swenson, 104 Neb. Illustrative-but not exhaustive-are the following examples: 1. All of Bierenbaums appeals over the years were unsuccessful. Encouraging that type of qualitative analysis is the common theme of this State's settled law on this subject (see People v. Pena, 251 A.D.2d 66, 673 N.Y.S.2d 688, affd. Contested are the way and reason her life ended, the way her killer disposed of her body immediately thereafter, and her killer's identity and state of mind. To reject any notion that the victim intended to use the letter a second time simply because she may have already used it once before would unreasonably ignore her various statements, her reasons for wanting a divorce, and her state of mind as that fateful weekend approached. A UNIT FINDINGS RECOMMENDATION FindLaw.com Free, trusted legal information for consumers and legal professionals, SuperLawyers.com Directory of U.S. attorneys with the exclusive Super Lawyers rating, Abogado.com The #1 Spanish-language legal website for consumers, LawInfo.com Nationwide attorney directory and legal consumer resources. (Lorenzo Ciniglio/Sygma via Getty Images), We knew it was going to be the toughest trial that wed ever had. Robert Bierenbaum Today: Where Is He Now in 2021? Something that might be very innocent might develop into a lead where she might be. In Nucci, the Court set forth the factors relevant to a trial justice's assessment of the reliability of out-of-court-statements which the People proffer as hearsay exceptions. Robert Bierenbaum daughter, second wife, family He is incapable of a shred of remorse.. I wanted her to stop yelling at me and I attacked her, he said, according to the article. denied 90 N.Y.2d 1009, 666 N.Y.S.2d 104, 688 N.E.2d 1387; People v Bonilla, supra; People v LaFrance, supra). A King County Superior Court jury today found Robert Parker guilty of two counts of aggravated murder in the stabbing and strangulation of two Shoreline-area That evening, he went to the home of his friend, Dr. Scott Baranoff. 662, 4 L.Ed.2d 620; People v. Norton, 164 A.D.2d 343, 353, 563 N.Y.S.2d 802, affd. Should we answer that inquiry in the affirmative, we next must weigh the relative probative force of conflicting testimony and the relative strength of conflicting inferences that may be drawn from the testimony (People ex rel. Defendant contends: 1) that the trial justice improperly allowed the People to adduce opinion testimony that he was able, as a trained surgical resident, to dismember the victim's body within ten minutes, and also capable of packing it into a flight bag, whether or not the body had been disarticulated; and 2) that the court improperly permitted the jury to watch a videotaped demonstration depicting how a pilot can, without any assistance, load a 110 pound body, so packaged, onto a Cessna 172 airplane, fly it over the ocean, and discard it overboard. Robert Bierenbaum was sentenced to 20 years to life and is currently incarcerated at New Yorks Attica Correctional Facility. To one of his Southampton summer housemates in July 1985, with a demeanor described as lacking in emotion, he said he and his wife fought on July 7 and she had taken a towel and some suntan lotion and had gone to Central Park.
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