Pod Insights Dark Downeast The Suspicious Death of Eduardo Tirella (Rhode Island) About this episode On October 7, 1966, the wealthy heiress Doris Duke hit and killed her friend Eduardo Tirella while behind the wheel of a rented car. Whether his death was an accident or an intentional act of murder, is still up for debate nearly 60 years later.
Transcript Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
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1:05 Kylie Low? On October 7, 1966, the wealthy heiress Doris Duke hit and killed her friend Eduardo Turella while behind the wheel of a rented car. Whether his death was an accident or an intentional act of murder is still up for debate nearly 60 years later. I'm Kylie Low, and this is the case of Eduardo Turella, on Dark Down East.
1:38 Kylie Low? It was 7 o'clock in the evening on September 17, 2021, and Newport Police Department cold case detective Jackie West had just hit record on an interview. Detective West had been assigned to review a closed case from more than five decades earlier, a motor vehicle versus pedestrian collision that resulted in the death of 42-year-old Eduardo Tirella. Newport Police Officer Edward Angel had been the first law enforcement official to arrive at the scene just outside of an estate on Bellevue Avenue that day, October 7, 1966. It was early evening, a little after 5:00 PM, when the call came in.
2:21 Kylie Low? He was a rookie cop with just about a year on the job. In the 2021 interview with Detective West, the now-retired Officer Angel said that "his training and experience so far had not prepared him for what he encountered."
2:36 Speaker 03 There was a, I observed a car off the road, on the sidewalk, up against a tree. I got out of my car, approached the vehicle. The driver of the car, who I had no idea who it was, was sitting in the car, behind the wheel, bleeding from, I think the forehead, if I remember right. Some facial cut. And she was upset, and she was crying, "My friend, my friend. I don't know where my friend is." And I looked in the backseat, passenger side, looked around, and then I got down on my hands and knees, and he was under the car, rolled up. I reached in, he didn't indicate any signs of life.
3:20 Speaker 03 Wasn't a lot of blood, as I remember it.
3:23 Kylie Low? Officer Angel said what he did next, he regrets. It was his inexperience showing.
3:30 Speaker 03 I got, this is where I goofed up. I came, stood up, and I says, rather unprofessionally, "He's under the car," which put her into a shock. And fortunately, there was a woman there that said she had some medical training, and I asked her if she could look at the driver of the vehicle, and then proceeded with letting the station know what was happening.
4:04 Kylie Low? The woman with medical training he mentioned was Judith Tom, a Navy ensign, who had come upon the scene with her father, Louis Tom, before Officer Angel got there. Officer Angel admitted that his recollections were spotty. After all, this was 55 years ago. Detective West tried to jog Edward's memory with a few original reports and diagrams with his name on them. She reads a few lines of an incident report out loud, including an excerpt from a statement he took from Judith's father, Louis, who the detective mistakenly refers to as "the nurse."
4:39 Speaker 04 I think that was the nurse. So I stopped to help the woman who was bleeding from the mouth. She kept yelling for someone named Ed. She then went up the driveway into the house and shortly thereafter came out saying she had run over him.
4:52 Kylie Low? Edward said he didn't remember taking the statement. All that stuck out in his mind from the scene itself so many years later was the woman at the wheel, bleeding from her face, and the victim pinned beneath the car, who he later learned was Ed, or Eduardo Tirella, who the woman had been calling out for. After the victim and the driver had been taken away in ambulances, Officer Angel took statements and then measured and noted what he saw at the scene. Tire marks in the position of the involved vehicle indicated it had come from inside the gates of a nearby estate and crossed Bellevue Avenue before hopping a sidewalk and ripping through an iron rail
5:35 Kylie Low? fence. It came to a rest at the base of a tree on the west side of Bellevue Avenue. The iron gates of the nearby estate were damaged and parts were strewn across the road. Those were collected and bagged as evidence, along with pieces of glass found in the driveway of the estate. In Edward's diagram from 1966, which Detective West references in the 2021 interview, he noted that the gates of the estate swung outward into the road and that he believed the point of impact with the victim was in the middle of Bellevue Avenue. This was based on residue, what he thought to be human skin tissue that he witnessed on the ground.
6:17 Kylie Low? But Edward explained to Detective West that the next day, Newport PD Sergeant Fred Newton called him back to the scene to fix something in his diagram. Sergeant Newton showed Officer Angel that the gates of the estate were supposed to open inward, not out, as he'd noted in the diagram. They had only been forced outward by the impact of the vehicle. The sergeant then shared his theory of the incident with the rookie officer. Sergeant Newton believed that the victim, Eduardo Tirella, had driven the car, a rented Dodge Polara station wagon, up to the gates, and then got out of the driver's seat to open them. Sergeant Newton suggested that the woman in the passenger seat slid over to take the wheel,
7:02 Kylie Low? and when she did, she either accidentally or intentionally stepped on the gas and hit the victim, causing him to roll up on the hood as she drove through the gates onto Bellevue Avenue, where he fell off the hood in the location where Officer Angel had seen evidence of skin tissue in the road. The car then continued forward until coming to a stop up against a tree with Eduardo beneath it. Satisfied with the hypothesis offered by his superior, Officer Angel signed off on a corrected version of his report, noting that the gates of the estate opened in toward the property.
7:41 Speaker 03 That was his theory, and whether it was an accident or intentional has always been a bone of contention.
7:48 Kylie Low? A bone of contention, indeed. But this theory by Sergeant Newton would not be part of the official conclusion of the case. Soon after, Newport Police Chief Joseph Radacey took over the investigation. Within days, the case was closed. Chief Radacey labeled Eduardo Tirella's death as nothing more than an unfortunate accident. But in all the years since he made that call, many have doubted its basis in truth. Rumors still linger like a dense fog over Bellevue Avenue, whispering that the driver, Doris Duke, got away with murder.
8:30 Kylie Low? Bellevue Avenue is its own majestic enclave within Newport, Rhode Island, and one of the most iconic streets in all of New England, known for its historic homes, opulent architecture, and ties to the Gilded Age. According to the Preservation Society of Newport County and Newport Discovery Guide, the two-and-a-half-mile stretch of Bellevue Avenue was once the summer playground for some of America's wealthiest families, who built grand estates there in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. They were referred to as cottages, though mansions is much more fitting. Among the estates on Bellevue Avenue, where the road bends into a sharp right-angle turn, is Rough Point.
9:14 Kylie Low? It was initially designed for Frederick W. Vanderbilt in the early 20th century by architect Horace Trumbauer, but it is best known as the estate of heiress Doris Duke. Doris Duke had been called "the richest girl in the world" when her father, James Buchanan Duke, the founder of American Tobacco Company, passed away in 1922. After suing her mother over the estate, it was almost entirely awarded to Doris, who was just a teenager. The dollar amount assigned to her inheritance varies from source to source. It was anywhere from $30 million to $133 million or more in assets.
9:58 Kylie Low? Adjusted for inflation, that's upwards of $1 billion today. Doris Duke's exceptional wealth and lifestyle have made her the object of intrigue for generations. Journalists, authors, television networks, and podcasts have not missed an opportunity to highlight the life and times of the tobacco heiress. In a majority of the newspaper clippings I've been able to access about the case of Eduardo Tirella, it is Doris's name that snags the headline, not Eduardo's. And yet, it was Eduardo who was behind so many of the beautiful and spectacular things in Doris's world.
10:39 Speaker 05 He curated her art and, to some extent, her life.
10:44 Kylie Low? That's Donna Lohmeyer, Eduardo Tirella's niece. Donna's mother was Eduardo's closest-in-age sibling in a large Italian immigrant family living in Dover, New Jersey.
10:55 Speaker 05 When I think of Eddie, of Uncle Eddie, I think that he was the happiest person I ever knew. And he spread that to everybody.
11:04 Kylie Low? Donna calls him Uncle Eddie. His birth certificate states his name as Eduardo, E-D-W-A-R-D-O. But he was most widely known as Eduardo, E-D-U-A-R-D-O. So that's the name and spelling I'll use.
11:22 Kylie Low? Eduardo's creative interests and abilities were obvious from an early age. Throughout high school, he was involved with drama club and the arts, and he was a cheerleader. After graduating high school in 1942, he entered the military during World War II. He earned a Bronze Star for his service. His hands and feet were frozen in the Battle of the Bulge, which left him hospitalized in France. Eduardo returned to civilian life in the United States with doctor's orders to settle in a warm climate. But before he eventually made his home in California with his partner, Edmund Kara, Eduardo lived in Brooklyn, New York. That's where his creative career blossomed.
12:06 Kylie Low? He worked as a milliner in New York City, designing and making hats at Saks Fifth Avenue. His designs were the crowns atop the heads of singer Peggy Lee, you might recognize her song Fever best, as well as Mae West, an American actor, singer, and entertainer known for her boundary-pushing roles that challenged social norms. Eduardo went on to design costumes for Mae West's Broadway production Diamond Lil. Donna has read reports that Eduardo may have even danced in the show. He certainly could have with his multifaceted talent and sparkle.
12:43 Speaker 05 He loved to dance. He loved to sing. He made friends with everybody. He brought Frank Sinatra home for Italian food. You know, just people would gravitate toward him. And that's really the secret of his success, his incredible talent and the fact that he was a magnet for goodwill with people.
13:01 Kylie Low? He brought Frank Sinatra home for Italian food. Donna mentions this in passing to her next anecdote about Eduardo, as casually cool about the big names who knew and loved her uncle as Eduardo was himself. His art, whether designing hats or later designing home interiors, landscapes and film sets, would lead Eduardo into a life among actors and singers and Hollywood royalty, even actual royalty. Eduardo was friends with the Duke and Duchess of Windsor.
13:35 Speaker 05 He never wore their celebrity as a badge of honor for him. He was a very modest and down-to-earth person. People revered him. He made everyone feel good. He helped wherever he could and he made everybody feel like a person, so to speak. He was the first person to say, "How can I help?" He was tireless.
14:00 Kylie Low? Eduardo met Doris Duke sometime in the 1950s. As a tribute to her late father, Doris was looking to bring her vision to life for a Gardens of the World display at her Duke Farms estate in New Jersey. Donna believes it was Peggy Lee who introduced Doris to Eduardo, who had already earned a reputation for his taste and eye when it came to design. He was hired for the job. The Gardens of the World project consisted of massive greenhouses.
14:33 Speaker 05 The objective of them was to have glass above heads so tall that you forgot that you were in an enclosure. They almost had their own environment, in addition to being so vast that you could walk around and see trees and sky and never realize that you were inside. Each one was a different continent. And for example, India had the Taj Mahal with an incredible long reflecting pool. There was a rainforest with orchids of all varieties.
15:06 Kylie Low? Doris and Eduardo's relationship only grew from there. He eventually had private living quarters at all of her estates, and traveled around the world with her, weighing in on acquisitions of antiques, and providing artistic and design direction for many more projects. For years, Eduardo was by Doris's side. But by the fall of 1966, his dreams reached far beyond the heiress. Eduardo's career in show business was taking shape in a big way. The first film he worked on was "Don't Make Waves", with Tony Curtis, Claudia Cardinale, and Sharon Tate. He did the artistic design and had a brief cameo carrying a plant into a room during one scene.
15:50 Kylie Low? His next gig was serving as the artistic director on "The Sandpiper", a film starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. He also made an on-screen appearance in that movie. Donna says Eduardo wanted to go all in on Hollywood, but he couldn't do that while working for Doris. So, when Eduardo returned to Newport and Doris's Rough Point estate on October 7, 1966, there was something he planned to do.
16:20 Speaker 05 He was there, I'm pretty safe in saying, to quit, Doris Duke.
16:25 Kylie Low? Before his employment ended, though, Doris reportedly had one more project to complete with Eduardo. Donna tells me that Doris had recently purchased a piece of antique art that she was having restored. Doris wanted Eduardo to accompany her to pick the piece up. That's where they were going when the pair approached the gates of Doris's estate on the night that Eduardo was killed.
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17:27 Kylie Low? I've been trying to get a head start on holiday shopping this year, and I've realized that some of the best gifts are just really nice versions of things people already use every day, which is why I always turn to my BFF, Quince. I got my daughter the cutest lightweight puffer jacket, which is perfect for layering during these colder months. And don't worry, she doesn't know how to find the podcast app yet, so she won't hear this and spoil her gift. As a New Englander, high-quality outerwear is key, but I can't justify paying triple digits for a jacket that'll fit her for, like, two snowstorms. Quince is high-quality, everyday essentials, not high prices, because they work directly with factories and cut out the middleman. I know you can find what you're looking for from Quince:
18:12 Kylie Low? cashmere sweaters, organic cotton basics, bedding, luggage, a gift for everyone, and hey, pal, you deserve to treat yourself too. Gold hoop earrings? Add to cart. Give the gift of quality this holiday season. Download the Quince app for app-exclusive offers, or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. Now available in Canada and the UK, too. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was dark down east. It's the best way to support the show.
18:49 Kylie Low? The original case file for this investigation is inexplicably missing from the Newport Police Department archives. I already knew this when I requested any and all documents from Newport PD as part of my reporting for this episode. Sergeant Gregory Belcher was able to provide me with some materials, including the audio recording from the 2021 interview with Officer Angel, but nothing from 1966. The missing case file is part of the lore of this case, and it's something that author Peter Lance picked apart in great detail in his book, Homicide at Rough Point. The author spent years investigating Eduardo Tirella's death
19:30 Kylie Low? and drawing his own conclusions about what really happened that day. In the process, a confidential source emailed the author a copy of the missing case file, parts of which are printed among the pages and in the appendices of his book. It's in those pieces of the case file, printed in Lance's book, where a few more details that Officer Angel couldn't remember during his interview with Detective West came to light for the first time in decades. The initial call reporting the crash on Bellevue Avenue was made by witness James Hanley. According to his brief statement in Officer Angel's report,
20:12 Kylie Low? James was driving south on Bellevue Avenue when he noticed a car that had crashed into a tree. He didn't see it happen. James went to help a woman who was sitting behind the wheel of the car bleeding from her mouth. The woman told James that her friend left, and she started walking around looking for the friend. Another passerby who had since come upon the scene stayed with the woman, presumably Judith Tom and her father, the other witnesses Officer Angel described. In Judith's statement, she says she got out of her vehicle to help the bleeding woman, and then followed the woman as she walked up the driveway and into her house. Judith says that the woman appeared to be in a state of shock,
20:55 Kylie Low? walking rapidly throughout the house calling out the name Ed. As the woman came down the stairs, she said that she'd run over Ed and left the house to find him. Judith tried to comfort the woman.
21:10 Kylie Low? Officer Angel received the call to respond to Bellevue Avenue from the Fire Department at 5:07 PM. His report states that he spoke to the driver of the vehicle at the scene, just as he recalled in his 2021 interview, and that when he realized a victim was underneath the vehicle, he and the man who first called for help tried to lift the car with their bumper jacks but were unsuccessful. Officer Angel called over his radio for urgent help from a wrecker and rescue wagon. Middletown and Newport rescue wagons responded, and then a wrecker arrived soon after and lifted the car off the victim, who was later identified as Eduardo Terrell. Eduardo's body was transported to Newport Hospital.
21:53 Kylie Low? Meanwhile, the driver of the vehicle, who had been identified as Doris Duke, was transported to the same hospital by the Middletown rescue wagon to be treated for shock and a laceration of the mouth, according to Officer Angel's report printed in Peter Lance's book. As news broke the next morning of the crash on Bellevue Avenue, Newport Police were hush-hush about the ongoing investigation. They said that they wouldn't be making any decisions or taking any action until they were able to question the driver, and that wouldn't end up happening for two days. According to Associated Press reporting in the Press of Atlantic City, county medical examiner Dr. Philip C.
22:37 Kylie Low? McAllister, who was also serving as Doris's personal physician, said he would not allow her to be questioned yet. He said, quote, "On the ordinary ground of humanity, anyone should be left alone under these circumstances until he's had a chance to compose himself," end quote. Police finally questioned Doris at Rough Point, late Sunday, October 9, in the presence of her attorney. According to reporting by the Providence Journal, Doris gave a brief statement, saying in part, quote, "We were going out of the estate. Mr. Terrell was the operator. We did what we have done 100 times before. The gate was locked. He was at the lock.
23:22 Kylie Low? The car was about 15 feet from the gate. I was getting ready to drive through the gate. The car just leapt forward, and I was on top of him. He was in the middle of the gate, at the lock at the time," end quote. She couldn't remember anything after that. This statement aligns in part with the theory that Sergeant Newton had developed just a day after the incident. Peter Lance reports in his book that Doris had apparently given an unofficial statement to a patrolman while she was in the hospital lobby on the day of the incident, so at least pieces of her story were discussed with a member of law enforcement before this official interview on October 9.
24:03 Kylie Low? In any event, Doris was the sole witness to the incident that brought a violent end to Eduardo's life, and that brief statement two days later seemed to satisfy investigators. By Monday, Chief Radacy was calling the case "an unfortunate accident." The next day, Tuesday, October 11, at St. Mary's Cemetery in Dover, New Jersey, the man celebrated for his landscape and botanical designs was laid to rest amidst the floral displays of sympathy from friends and family and celebrities like Kim Novak and Elizabeth Taylor, the producers and other industry colleagues alike.
24:43 Kylie Low? The Herald News reports that among the flowers were two unusual arrangements of red roses, sent by Doris Duke herself. Doris was not in attendance. The same day of Eduardo's memorial service in New Jersey, Doris was supposedly questioned for a second time up in Newport. A United Press International report in The Morning Call dated October 12, 1966, indicates that after the initial statement from Doris, police still needed answers to a few questions. Now, I say "supposedly questioned" for a second time because the author, Peter Lance,
25:24 Kylie Low? suggests that there is doubt as to whether Doris actually answered any questions. He writes that a source close to the case told him that Chief Radacy knew that the investigation into Eduardo's death was lacking, and with the Attorney General breathing down his neck, Chief Radacy turned to Doris's attorney. They came to the agreement that if Chief Radacy wrote something up, Doris would sign it. A supposed three-page transcript of the second interview with Doris was the result.
25:58 Kylie Low? Excerpts of the transcript were published in the Providence Journal in 1971. The book Homicide at Rough Point contains scans of the entire transcript in question. According to the transcript, Doris claimed Eduardo stopped the car about 12 to 15 feet from the north gate of Rough Point, and he got up to open it so they could drive out. Doris continued, quote, "I slid over to the driver's seat, and I placed my left foot on the brake, and I disengaged the gear with my right hand. The car shot ahead," end quote. The full transcript shows that Doris gave one-word answers to most of the questions that followed.
26:41 Kylie Low? "Did you shift the gear from parked position?" "Yes." "What gear did you shift into?" "Drive." "You place your foot on the brake also?" "Yes." "The car then moved forward?" "Yes." "Can you estimate the speed the car went forward?" "No." Question. "Was there any possibility, Ms. Duke, that your foot could have engaged the accelerator pedal?" "Not to my knowledge," she said. Doris went on to say that the handbrake was not on when the car was in the parked position, and she did not have time to pull the handbrake to stop the car once it was in motion.
27:22 Kylie Low? When asked again if there was a possibility that her foot slipped off the brake pedal and onto the accelerator pedal, she responded that it could have happened. "In a handwritten and initialled correction," she adds, "but I have no recollection of it." Along with this second statement, another outstanding item was cleared up in the investigation. Doris apparently proved that she had a driver's license at the time of the incident, although records don't support this conclusion. The most recent license of Doris's that Peter Lance could find in his investigation of the case had expired in 1956, some 10 years before.
28:04 Kylie Low? But with Doris's full account of the crash from that second interview, whether it happened or not, as far as Newport PD and Chief Radesy were concerned, the case was closed. Eduardo's death was officially ruled an accident.
28:22 Kylie Low? A week after news broke of the accident and Eduardo Tirella's death, and just days after the case was closed without criminal charges, Doris Duke's name made headlines again for an entirely different reason. T. Curtis Forbes writes for the Newport Daily News that on Saturday, October 15, 1966, Doris made a $25,000 pledge to the Cliff Walk Restoration Effort. If adjusted for inflation, that sum is equivalent to just under $240,000 today. Her generous contributions to Newport causes didn't stop there. Peter Lance writes in his book that Doris Next gave $10,000 to Newport Hospital,
29:07 Kylie Low? where she received care following the accident. Donating large sums of money was not unusual for Doris Duke. Though she was known to spend her money on extravagant projects at her numerous estates and invest in rare and expensive art, Doris had a philanthropic side, too. But however generous she was known to be, Doris's contribution to the Cliff Walk Restoration Project specifically raised eyebrows. She had been publicly resistant to the project in the past. The three-and-a-half-mile-long path along the oceanfront flanked her Rough Point Estate and brought "looky-loos" to her property. In the late 1950s and early 60s, she put up a wire fence and tall hedges
29:51 Kylie Low? in an attempt to keep people from passing that section of the path, but still, they got through. Reports say that Doris had been wanting to "do something" for Newport for a while, and the contribution could have been in the works before Eduardo's death. But whether that's true or not, the rumor mill didn't care. When the case was quickly closed as an accident without further investigation, the timing of her donation to that cause she previously rejected was called into question. Were Doris's monetary moves in the wake of the incident her way of thanking the city of Newport for looking the other way and masking her culpability for the tragic incident? I asked Donna what she thought.
30:35 Kylie Low? In your opinion, with all the research that you've done, what you know to be true...
30:41 Speaker 05 Do you believe Doris Duke got away with murdering your uncle? Without a shadow of a doubt. And I think that if you've got 100 people in the room who had familiarity with this, you would have a hard time finding anyone who didn't believe that.
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31:33 Kylie Low? I've been trying to get a head start on holiday shopping this year, and I've realized that some of the best gifts are just really nice versions of things people already use every day, which is why I always turn to my BFF, Quince. I got my daughter the cutest lightweight puffer jacket, which is perfect for layering during these colder months. And don't worry, she doesn't know how to find the podcast app yet, so she won't hear this and spoil her gift. As a New Englander, high-quality outerwear is key, but I can't justify paying triple digits for a jacket that'll fit her for, like, two snowstorms. Quince is high-quality, everyday essentials, not high prices, because they work directly with factories and cut out the middleman. I know you can find what you're looking for from Quince:
32:17 Kylie Low? cashmere sweaters, organic cotton basics, bedding, luggage, a gift for everyone, and hey, pal, you deserve to treat yourself, too. Gold hoop earrings? Add to cart. Give the gift of quality this holiday season. Download the Quince app for app-exclusive offers or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365-day returns, now available in Canada and the UK, too. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was Dark Down East. It's the best way to support the show.
32:54 Kylie Low? To put it simply, there is evidence to support the suggestion that Doris Duke intentionally drove the rented station wagon into Eduardo Tirella. One of the most compelling arguments lies in the details of Eduardo's autopsy report, and the inconsistencies between those findings and what Doris said happened that day. Now, Doris stated that Eduardo was crushed against the gates of her estate when the car leapt forward. However, Donna managed to dig up her Uncle Eddie's autopsy report, which had been incorrectly filed under the name Edmund, and the pathological diagnosis does not align with what Doris claimed happened.
33:38 Kylie Low? If Eduardo was pinned and crushed against the gates, you might expect to see extensive lower body injuries, especially given the force of the vehicle moving forward. I mean, it was strong enough to force the gates the wrong way out into the street, and based on photos, all the damage to the gates was at a height below Eduardo's waist. But the only documented injury of Eduardo's lower body was a fracture of his right hip. The other injuries included skull fractures, broken spine, extensive sternum and rib fractures, broken right arm, massive brain hemorrhage, complete tear of the spinal cord, and more. According to Peter Lance,
34:20 Kylie Low? these injuries could be more accurately explained by the theory Sergeant Fred Newton shared with Officer Angel, that Eduardo was hit, flew up onto the hood of the car, but then fell off and was dragged beneath the vehicle. What would have caused Eduardo to fall off the hood of the car? Perhaps a hesitation, the driver hitting the brakes, and then accelerating again. It's an argument for intent. But why would Doris want to kill the person who had been by her side for years, who helped make her life beautiful, who was her confidant and friend? What motive could she have to intentionally step on the gas and drag his body across Bellevue Avenue and violently end his life?
35:05 Kylie Low? Doris has been called possessive, controlling, jealous, and vindictive. And she had demonstrated her violent nature in the past. A 1964 UPI report in The New York Times states that Doris's former common-law husband, jazz musician Joe Castro, was suing Doris for $150,000 in damages after she allegedly stabbed him in the arm. Donna told me that Eduardo's partner and friends, and even a psychic, had cautioned him about Doris. They believed the heiress to be volatile and violent and feared what her reaction would be to learning that Eduardo planned to leave her side in pursuit of growing his career in Hollywood.
35:48 Kylie Low? And accounts by Rough Point staff support a theory that Doris was indeed upset and that they had argued before the fatal event occurred.
35:59 Speaker 05 Apparently, he had told her that he was leaving. And the estate manager and others overheard a violent argument prior to their leaving for the antique place, prior to his death.
36:13 Kylie Low? What's more, Donna told me that her father saw evidence at the scene of an intentional acceleration.
36:21 Speaker 05 My brother and dad got in a car almost immediately and drove up to Newport and inspected the scene and then spent the night and went over the scene again during the day. My father was an electrical engineer in avionics, aerospace, moon program, and very bright man, not given to histrionics, a very analytical guy. And he knew immediately what had happened.
36:51 Kylie Low? There in the gravel of Rough Point's driveway were two gouges about the width of tires. It looked like someone suddenly stepped on the gas pedal and the car tires spun into action, leaving the telltale marks behind.
37:08 Kylie Low? For Eduardo's family, there was no doubt in their minds that foul play was involved, but they had little recourse with the police investigation closed. There was something they could do, though, outside of criminal proceedings, to prove that Doris was responsible for Eduardo's death and be compensated for it. On December 7, 1967, Eduardo's sister, Alice Romano, filed a negligence suit on behalf of all her siblings against Doris Duke for the sum of $1.25 million. A second suit for an equal amount was also filed against the rental car company for the vehicle involved in Eduardo's death.
37:49 Kylie Low? The file for the negligence suit against Doris is gone, missing, destroyed, whatever happened to it, it's not at the Judicial Records Center, but there are bits and pieces of the proceedings documented in the Providence Journal, Newport Daily News, and other publications. The plaintiffs alleged that Doris negligently and carelessly drove the vehicle which dragged Eduardo across Bellevue Avenue for a great distance, causing his death. As a result, the suit claimed, Eduardo's surviving family members were deprived of his potential earnings. The case proceeded in June of 1971. Doris herself was among the witnesses who testified, recounting the story of that day
38:31 Kylie Low? five years earlier when Eduardo got out of the driver's seat to open the gate. The field investigator for the Registrar of Motor Vehicles testified that when he inspected the car three days after the accident, the car could only move about 10 feet forward and backward due to the damage sustained in the crash. However, their tests showed that the throttle moved freely and the foot pedals moved as they should. These findings were in the face of any suggestion that the car was faulty and that it could have accelerated forward on its own due to defect. During the damages phase, Eduardo's siblings testified to the success their brother was already seeing in Hollywood.
39:12 Kylie Low? According to an Associated Press report, Eduardo had told his brother Francis Tirella just a few months before he was killed that he felt like he had finally arrived. But Doris's defense team worked to discredit this assessment of Eduardo's earning potential and presented the victim instead as a ne'er-do-well, who was bad with money and didn't have a nickel to his name. A ruling was finally issued in July of 1971, and the case was decided in favor of Eduardo's family, though nowhere near the amount they saw it when they first filed the suit. They were awarded just $75,000 in damages plus interest and costs, about $96,000 total.
39:56 Kylie Low? The amount was split among eight siblings. So Doris Duke was found negligent in civil court, but since this was not a criminal case, she wouldn't face jail time for her negligence. Still, there was lasting suspicion from Eduardo's family and many others that what Doris did that evening was not merely negligence, but an intentional killing. Yet, the case remained closed. Until 50 years later, when a witness called Newport Police with an unbelievable story.
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41:18 Kylie Low? Following the release of Peter Lance's book, Homicide at Rough Point, a man named Robert Walker caught wind of the conclusions the author had reached from his investigation. He felt it was finally the right time to come forward. You see, Robert, who goes by Bob, had been keeping a secret from Newport Police since 1966. He says he was there on the day Doris Duke hit and killed Eduardo Turella. Bob called Newport Police on July 1, 2021, and his story prompted a review of the case. It was assigned to Detective West, who sat down with Bob for an interview the next day.
42:02 Speaker 07 So you've come here on your own and you'd like to just offer some information in regards to the incident with the accident that occurred with Doris Duke and Eduardo let me get his last name correct Terrell. It wasn't an accident. Okay. In my opinion. No, that's, that's fine. So, tell me what, what you wanted to talk about. Yeah, the story.
42:30 Kylie Low? In 1966, Bob was a paper boy in Newport. His route included Bellevue Avenue, and he was supposed to be done by 4:30. But that Friday, October 7th, he was running a little late. It was around 5:00 PM when he rounded the corner of Ledge Road onto Bellevue.
42:50 Speaker 07 So, just about the time I hit the corner of Ledge and Bellevue, I could hear two people arguing, fighting, screaming at each other.
43:00 Kylie Low? He believes the voices were a man and woman in an argument. He couldn't make out what they were saying, but the tone of voice wasn't nice. He was still on his bike, pedaling up the street, when the screaming stopped.
43:14 Speaker 07 The next thing I hear is the roar of an engine, like a roar, you know? Then I hear a crash. And in the consequences of that, I'm hearing a man screaming. You know what I mean? Now, when you hear the crash, do you look over? Well, I can't look because I haven't got there yet. Okay. You know, I'm still, I'm heading the blind side of Bellevue Avenue on the corner.
43:41 Kylie Low? Bob keeps pumping the pedals, bringing him closer to the source of the sounds.
43:46 Speaker 07 And I swear, I heard after crash, the guy screaming, and I actually heard, I believe I heard like a, like a little skid. Definitely deceleration of the motor. Acceleration? The decel, deceleration of the motor. And a slight delay. And now the screaming of a man, and I, and he was saying no. We went from fighting to excitable, what the hell? Kind of tone, I'm only going by tone. Yep. And then it turned, like, to horror. Like, no!
44:26 Kylie Low? After that, the sound of another crash.
44:30 Speaker 07 A convoluted crash. And within like five to seven seconds, I cleared the corner. And I looked down and there was someone just like opening the door. But being the diligent paper boy that I was, you know, I went right to the box, you know, because I'm already running a little late. And dropped the paper, looked over, there was someone out.
44:55 Kylie Low? Bob said he saw a woman was standing outside of the car and looking down as he rode up on his bicycle. The woman was unaware of his presence until the telltale clicks of his 10-speed bicycle seemed to snap her out of a daze.
45:11 Speaker 07 And she spins on me and she looks at me and I was like, "Are you all right, man? Can I help you?" And she spins on me and she goes, "You better get the hell out of here!" And I'm like, you know, as a kid, I was like...
45:22 Speaker 04 Right.
45:24 Kylie Low? Bob said he did as he was told. He pedaled off, taking a right on Ocean Avenue and rode past Bailey Beach and beyond. Bob could hear sirens in the distance and assumed they were responding to the scene that he'd just been ordered to leave. When Bob got home late for dinner, he was greeted by his strict father, who asked why he was late. Bob told his dad there was a car accident. But it wasn't until the next day, when reports of that accident hit the press, that Bob realized exactly what he'd encountered the night before. Bob decided to tell his dad about what he saw and heard.
46:03 Speaker 07 He grabs me by the collar and he drags me out of the front porch. And it's an enclosed porch. He drags me right up against the wall. And he says, "No, you listen, me, son. You will never, ever, never tell anybody this story again. You understand me?"
46:17 Kylie Low? Bob says he didn't speak of it again until he was 17 years old and about to enlist in the Marine Corps. He asked his father why he forbade him to speak about what he saw that day on Bellevue Avenue.
46:29 Speaker 07 "All right, Bobby," he says, "I'll be straight up." And he says, "I was afraid that she would have you killed."
46:36 Kylie Low? As Bob got older, the volume of his father's warnings faded in his mind, while the nagging feeling that he should have spoken up and gone to the police with what he saw grew stronger. The story started to seep out of him, bit by bit. In 1973, when friends from the Marine Corps came to visit him in Newport, Bob says he took them up to the gates of the Doris Duke estate and recounted what he heard and saw there on the day of the incident. He also told his brother and sister. Each time, he says he recounted the yelling between a man and woman, the two distinct accelerations of a car motor, the face of the woman who ordered him away from the scene.
47:21 Kylie Low? Soon, by Bob's own estimation, he told the story at least 50 times. In fact, before sitting down for the interview with the Newport Police Department, he'd called many of the people who'd heard his firsthand account of that day, just to make sure they all remembered and would corroborate that he'd told them the story sometime in the past.
47:42 Speaker 07 Because it's a fascinating story. It really is, kind of, you know?
47:47 Speaker 04 Yeah, no, it is.
47:48 Speaker 07 It's a fascinating story. It is the story.
47:52 Kylie Low? Bob's version of events was compelling. If what he says he heard was true, an argument and two distinct accelerations, it gives more credence to an intentional murder theory. There was one more piece of Bob's story that Detective West teased out towards the end of their over-two-hour-long conversation.
48:14 Speaker 04 One last question. Did you remember if Doris Duke had any injuries when you were talking to her?
48:20 Speaker 07 You know, that's something that I kind of thought about. No, none. No. They say she was bleeding in her face. No.
48:29 Speaker 04 You don't remember seeing it?
48:31 Speaker 07 No, it's not that I don't remember. No, I don't remember. There was no blood.
48:35 Kylie Low? If Doris Duke was out of her car without any visible injuries or blood immediately following the crash, how then did she get those injuries on her face that Officer Edward Angel reported seeing when he arrived at the scene? Did she give herself those injuries as part of an already hatched scheme to cover up murder? If what Bob Walker says he heard and saw is true, it could change everything. Eduardo Tirella's case was not technically reopened, but Newport Police continued with a review of the original investigation through the summer and fall of 2021.
49:17 Kylie Low? This review included Detective West's interview with retired Officer Edward Angel, part of which you heard at the beginning of this episode. During that conversation, Edward Angel wonders out loud about the legitimacy of Bob Walker's story and the timing of it all.
49:33 Speaker 03 Like I say, along comes this testimony and it kind of, you have to figure out if he's telling the truth, there's reason to question.
49:42 Speaker 04 He does sound credible. I mean, I've talked to, you know, people he grew up with, who he told the story two years ago, and everything's pretty consistent. And he's told this story like, oh, several times, it's pretty consistent.
49:54 Speaker 03 If that, if this is in fact what he observed, then there's very good reason to think that she tried to cover it up.
50:04 Kylie Low? But however credible Detective West found Bob Walker to be, it did not change the conclusions reached by Newport PD after the 2021 review. According to Rob Dukas' reporting for Newport this week, Newport's Communications Officer Tom Shelvin released a statement on November 23rd saying, quote, "There were only two people in the car that day. And while from an administrative standpoint, we would have certainly preferred to have seen the cloud of uncertainty lifted from this case, our review was not able to support any new declarations." To that end, it would be imprudent to either reclassify this incident or to offer any further commentary beyond our official opinion.
50:48 Kylie Low? Accordingly, as we have previously articulated, it remains the opinion of the Newport Police Department that there is not sufficient evidence to draw any firm conclusions as to the motivations of Ms. Duke. For that reason, it appears that this will continue to be a case that will have to be left to the court of public opinion. End quote. Whatever you believe about Eduardo Terrell's death, what you choose to take from the autopsy results, the witness statements, the timing of Doris's financial generosity in Newport, the disappearing case file and court records, Bob Walker's story 50 years after the fact,
51:31 Kylie Low? all of it, Doris has never and will never face any criminal charges related to Eduardo's death. She died in 1993. Eduardo's niece Donna maintains her own conclusions.
51:46 Speaker 05 While I think it was intent to kill murder, I don't think it was premeditated. I don't think she premeditated anything, ever. People made decisions for her or she reacted with knee jerk. And that's what I think this was. Not you. I think it was, he's not going to leave me and get away with it. Nobody leaves me.
52:07 Kylie Low? Donna keeps photos of her Uncle Eddie up around her house. Her favorite one is of Eddie walking down the street in Europe, a briefcase in one hand and what looks like a stack of books in the other. He's in motion, walking towards the camera with a grin that reaches all the way up to his eyes.
52:27 Speaker 05 And that's the way I think of him, always. He had wonderful eyes that sparkled. He laughed constantly. I mean, I remember his laugh more than his voice. His eyes were, we call them, they're family eyes. And he had them. And people would just melt into them and gravitate toward him. If he were in a room with 100 other people, he would be the magnet that people were attracted to. It made you feel good about yourself.
52:59 Kylie Low? Uncle Eddie's legacy lives on in Donna's life and the lives of countless others, who still, to this day, almost 60 years later, remember Eduardo for how he lived, not how he died.
53:13 Speaker 05 I think that whatever he did, he made the world, in whatever his endeavor, he made the world more beautiful, and that was his intent. He made the world kinder and made life better for many, many people.
53:37 Kylie Low? Thank you for listening to Dark Down East. You can find all source material for this case at darkdowneast.com. Be sure to follow the show on Instagram, at Dark Down East. This platform is for the families and friends who have lost their loved ones and for those who are still searching for answers. I'm not about to let those names or their stories get lost with time. I'm Kylie Low, and this is Dark Down East. Dark Down East is a production of Kylie Media and Audio Check. So what do you think, Chuck? Do you approve?
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