E! True Hollywood Story - Unsolved Case of Karyn Kupcinet
E! True Hollywood Story - Unsolved Case of Karyn Kupcinet
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00:00We mentioned this very delightful little lady, you write her name down, because a couple
00:24of years from now she's going to be a very, very important name in the motion picture
00:29business stage too, and her name is Karen Kupcinat.
00:45Karen Kupcinat never got the chance to fulfill her promise.
00:50On November 30th, 1963, a 22-year-old actress was found murdered in her West Hollywood apartment.
00:57The killer has never been found.
01:02Karen Kupcinat occupies a lonely corner of Hollywood mythology, the girl destined for
01:07stardom whose biggest close-up came in death.
01:12In the next hour, we will recount the haunting story of Karen Kupcinat.
01:18It was, to me, the quintessential story of the young woman who comes west to be a movie
01:22star and finds death instead.
01:24We will explore Karen's brutal desire for perfection.
01:28If she gained three pounds, she would go crazy and she'd take a diet pill.
01:32We will examine how a broken love affair pushed Karen towards the edge.
01:36I did not see deeply enough who she was and how lonely she was.
01:42We will unravel the events which led to her mysterious death.
01:47Karen was the epitome of what you think of as a victim.
01:51And finally, we will discover how Karen touched the life of the niece she never knew.
01:57I want people to see that she was just a human being, just a woman trying to make it.
02:04This is the story of broken dreams and innocence lost.
02:08This is the story of Karen Kupcinat, the E! True Hollywood Story.
02:17Her life's ambition was to be a star.
02:21She never recovered from a public scandal.
02:36November 30th, 1963.
02:43The nation mourned the death of President John F. Kennedy,
02:47assassinated in Dallas one week earlier.
02:51In Los Angeles, actor Mark Goddard and his wife, Marsha,
02:57were preparing to go out for a Saturday evening.
03:00I was shaving, and I was looking in the mirror,
03:03and all of a sudden, Karen.
03:05I was looking at Karen, and I was thinking of Karen.
03:09Mark and Marsha were concerned about their friend,
03:1222-year-old actress Karen Kupcinat.
03:15She had been extremely depressed over a broken relationship.
03:19I just knew that something had happened.
03:21So it took us about 20 minutes to get there, from where we lived to her apartment.
03:27I parked near the garage of her apartment house.
03:32I went up the stairs, and I could sense the heaviness of death.
03:37I really could, and I walked, and I walked down the hallway,
03:41you know, outside hallway, to her door.
03:44When I opened the door, and it was dark in her apartment,
03:48we walked into the room,
03:51and I saw there was a bowl of cigarettes over on the floor,
03:54and the television was on.
03:56The whole room looked black and white, except for this figure of a body.
04:00And I went over, and I said,
04:02Karen, Karen, wake up.
04:04Thinking that maybe she had taken an overdose of drugs or something.
04:09And then I turned the lamp on, and I just screamed.
04:14We ran out, and called down,
04:17Suicide, suicide, there's been a suicide.
04:23But 22-year-old Karen Kupcinat was no suicide.
04:27The coroner determined she was strangled.
04:30Friends and family anticipated a swift resolution to the crime.
04:36There were, however, more questions than answers.
04:40Karen's father, Chicago columnist Irv Kupcinat.
04:44The cruelest moment came when one of the top officers told us,
04:47well, your daughter now is a statistic.
04:50More than three decades later, Karen's murder remains unsolved.
04:58Karen never found stardom, but she won the role of a tragic icon,
05:03writer Sam Kashner.
05:05Karen Kupcinat is a kind of stand-in
05:09for every young woman who wanted to go to Hollywood,
05:12who was the cutest or perkiest girl in her class,
05:16and winds up there looking for stardom,
05:20and finds out that it's a kind of mirrored haven for lost souls.
05:28About to make a better life for all of our citizens.
05:32A dangerously destabilizing precedent.
05:36Time and events swept Karen Kupcinat out of the public's memory.
05:42The story might have ended here,
05:48if it weren't for a young woman named Carrie Kupcinat.
05:51To me, she was like a legend.
05:54Ever since I was so young, I would look at pictures of her and think,
05:57gosh, she was so beautiful, and she was so talented and wonderful,
06:01and so I always thought how wonderful it would be to be like her.
06:06Carrie is the niece Karen never got the chance to meet,
06:09the daughter of Karen's brother, Jerry.
06:13In 1989, when Carrie was 17,
06:16she discovered her aunt's publicity file at the Los Angeles Film Academy library.
06:22She had to find out more.
06:25My grandparents started bringing out boxes and boxes of stuff
06:29that they had kept, you know, letters that she had written,
06:32and diaries, and publicity photos, and childhood photos.
06:35She was suddenly was starting to become a real person,
06:38and a real person that might have, you know, been like me.
06:42The letters and diaries revealed that Carrie and Karen shared similar traits.
06:47Like Karen, Carrie pursued acting,
06:50carefully documented her life,
06:53and suffered from an eating disorder.
06:57One obvious distinction, writer James Elroy.
07:01Karen Kupcinat never got the chance to grow up.
07:05Karen Kupcinat did not have the presence of mind that Carrie developed.
07:10Were it not for Karen Kupcinat and the road that she went down,
07:15Carrie Kupcinat might have foundered in Hollywood the way Karen did.
07:19Coming up, Karen is entranced by the magic of Hollywood.
07:23It was very glamorous, and she only saw that side of it.
07:26And later,
07:27I thought she took her own life because of her broken love affair with Andy Prine.
07:45On November 3rd,
07:48On November 30th, 1963,
07:5122-year-old actress Karen Kupcinat was found murdered in her West Hollywood apartment.
07:56Police never found her killer.
08:00The vestiges of Karen's life lay in the shadows,
08:03until they were brought to light by her niece in 1989.
08:07I suddenly felt like I'm related to this person,
08:10and this terrible thing happened to her,
08:13and I have to try to find out more about it.
08:18The more Carrie Kupcinat read her Aunt Karen's diaries,
08:21The more Carrie Kupcinat read her Aunt Karen's diaries,
08:24the more fascinated she became.
08:37Karen Kupcinat grew up privileged.
08:40Her father, Irv Kupcinat, was a businessman.
08:43His father, Irv Kupcinat, was a businessman.
08:46Her father, Irv Kupcinat, was a syndicated columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times.
08:49Her father, Irv Kupcinat, was a syndicated columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times.
08:52Karen's mother, Essie, nurtured a passion for the performing arts in her daughter.
08:55Irv and Essie nicknamed their pride and joy, Cookie.
08:58Irv and Essie nicknamed their pride and joy, Cookie.
09:01She was a born actress.
09:04She never stopped.
09:07She was a natural.
09:10Every time she was in any kind of a show at school,
09:14Karen's younger brother, Jerry.
09:17She was always either reading plays or in plays at school,
09:20Karen's younger brother, Jerry.
09:23or we'd go to plays.
09:26A visit to the Kupcinat household was almost like going to the movies.
09:29A visit to the Kupcinat household was almost like going to the movies.
09:32There were always celebrities around, so you never knew who would be there.
09:35A lot of the film stars of the 40s and 50s
09:38would make their way to the Kupcinat's apartment.
09:42Joan Crawford coming in the middle of the night,
09:45making her do calisthenics,
09:48and Burt Lancaster carrying her on his big shoulders.
09:53Family vacations often took the Kupcinats to Los Angeles.
09:56Family vacations often took the Kupcinats to Los Angeles.
09:59It was very glamorous, and she only saw that side of it.
10:02And she only saw the side that PR people would present to a columnist.
10:05Karen's acting break came in Chicago at the age of 13.
10:08She was asked by a family friend
10:11to be Carol Lindley's understudy in a play called Anniversary Waltz.
10:14to be Carol Lindley's understudy in a play called Anniversary Waltz.
10:17She had a curiosity and a generosity as a human being, even as a kid,
10:20that was very noticeable.
10:23I mean, I can still remember her bouncing up and down the steps to this day.
10:26Lead roles in high school plays,
10:29and later in Chicago theater, came easily for the Ingenue.
10:32In the fall of 1959,
10:35Karen moved to New York to conquer Broadway.
10:39But she later described that experience
10:42as one of the low periods in her life.
10:45I couldn't help being aware of the attitudes
10:48manifested by producers, directors, etc.
10:53They were gracious and friendly to me.
10:56They saw me only as Kup's daughter,
10:59never as a 19-year-old girl with talent.
11:02This led to self-doubt, insecurities, and humiliation for me.
11:05Karen's insecurities led to an obsession
11:09with her appearance.
11:12She gained and lost weight,
11:15agonizing over each extra pound on the scale.
11:18Her body was not a tall skin.
11:21She was short, and she had kind of a round,
11:24kind of like a tiny Marilyn Monroe-y kind of figure.
11:27In her search for perfection,
11:30Karen had a plastic surgeon reshape her chin.
11:33But her new look changed little
11:36Her family friend Jerry Lewis offered Karen a bit part
11:39in his upcoming movie, The Ladies' Man.
11:42I'd been in New York, and I hadn't been working very much,
11:45but I'd been learning quite a bit and going to classes out there.
11:48And the thought of working in Hollywood sort of intrigued me.
11:51In December, a resolute Karen headed to Los Angeles.
11:54She was 19 years old.
11:57She was smart. She was ambitious.
12:00She was talented. She had so many hopes and dreams.
12:06Coming up...
12:09Karen loses weight to gain self-esteem.
12:12She would go crazy, and she'd take a diet pill.
12:15And later...
12:18One of the guys took me aside and said,
12:21Don't you know that when Karen comes tonight,
12:24was found dead?
12:27The E! True Hollywood Story is on every night at 9.
12:30This week, it's Fallen Angels.
12:36Karen Kupcinat grew up with entertainment in her blood.
12:39When Hollywood beckoned in 1960,
12:42the 19-year-old was determined to prove she could make it as an actress.
12:45The door to fame was open,
12:48but what lurked beyond was unknown.
12:51She could have stayed in Chicago and been a queen.
12:54It was very brave of her to come to Hollywood.
13:06Unlike many other aspiring actresses who came before her,
13:09Karen Kupcinat didn't arrive in Los Angeles alone and penniless.
13:12The first time I met her was at the airport
13:15when I went to pick her up.
13:18And she came down with her grandmother
13:21off the runway with about 47 different suitcases.
13:24Karen's father, famed columnist Irv Kupcinat,
13:27asked family friend Marsha Ross for a big favor.
13:30My job was to oversee her,
13:34watch her, take care of her,
13:37introduce her to the right people,
13:40and make sure that she didn't get in any trouble.
13:43An apartment in Hollywood became home for Karen and her grandmother.
13:46By late December 1960,
13:49Karen made her appearance in The Lady's Man.
13:52But what she saw on the big screen
13:55was not the image she expected.
13:58Oh, Catherine, Ms. Wellermann wanted me to tell you...
14:02And talking and acting and...
14:05Oh, it was just horrible.
14:08Anyway, I'm trying to get used to it,
14:11but I don't think you're ever really satisfied.
14:14Soon after her move to Los Angeles,
14:17Karen recorded her thoughts in a date book.
14:20There were few entries in the diary
14:23until May 16, 1961,
14:26when she had plastic surgery on her nose.
14:29Agony, felt needles,
14:32cutting, everything.
14:35Here's this woman who's not yet 22 years old
14:38who's having her face fixed,
14:41and there's an amazing entry,
14:44this kind of heartbreaking entry in one of her journals,
14:47where she said, Warren Beatty said,
14:50I'm pretty today, and Eddie Fisher said,
14:53you look like Liz, and that's the kind of thing
14:57that struck her to see Eddie Fisher.
15:00Eddie Fisher had been married to Liz Taylor.
15:03After the show, we went backstage with Eddie,
15:06and he said, I've never seen a resemblance
15:09so keen, so perfect, and it caught my eye
15:12and it caught my breath, he said.
15:15Still, confidence remained elusive to Karen.
15:18She hated rejection, because she was so accepted all the time,
15:21and she comes from Chicago, where she's so well-known,
15:25and she goes to Hollywood,
15:28and people were finding out about her, but it took a while.
15:31In June, 1961, a chance meeting
15:34turned into a golden opportunity for the 20-year-old.
15:37Just a quirk of fate, I happened to see a producer,
15:40and he asked me to come in and read for Hawaiian Eye,
15:43and I read for a part on it, and I got it,
15:46and it was strictly on talent.
15:49Karen's luck continued in August,
15:52in another TV series, Mrs. G Goes to College.
15:55But nothing could alleviate Karen's anxiety about her weight.
15:58If you looked at her, you'd think she was perfect,
16:01so I don't know whether it was all in her head,
16:04or whether she was getting this reaction from other people
16:07that she went to work with.
16:10Eventually, Karen discovered what she believed
16:13was the perfect solution, diet pills.
16:16She was living with my mother.
16:20My cookie had pills all over the place.
16:23Finally, Cookie put them in a laundry hamper,
16:26and my mother found them and said,
16:29you're on pills.
16:32To that generation, that was pretty horrible.
16:35If she gained 3 pounds, she would go crazy,
16:38and she'd take a diet pill.
16:41I could tell when she was on them,
16:44because she was always a little bit more excited
16:48I looked too heavy, yet everyone calls me beautiful.
16:51February 1st, 117 pounds,
16:54everyone noticed my weight loss.
16:57February 5th, 125 pounds,
17:00I stayed in bed, ate,
17:03feel so draggy and tired.
17:06February 15th, 121 pounds,
17:09took pills, looked gorgeous.
17:12In late February 1962,
17:15Mrs. G. Goes to College was canceled.
17:18She was a good actress.
17:21She put on an act several times with us,
17:24because she didn't want to worry us,
17:27and then my mother couldn't take it there anymore,
17:30and she moved back,
17:33so Cookie was living alone and loved it.
17:37Coming up, Karen becomes driven
17:40by another obsession.
17:43You're young, you're going to be young forever,
17:46you're going to be a star forever.
17:49Tomorrow on E!,
17:52at 8, talk soup with new host Hal Sparks.
17:55At 8.30, mysteries and scandals
17:58expose the secrets of Hollywood outcast Ingrid Bergman.
18:01At 9, the E! True Hollywood story
18:05reveals ice-skating's fallen diva Tanya Hart.
18:08Tomorrow, starting at 8, only on E!.
18:11Times change in Tinseltown.
18:14I'm A.J. Benza, host of E!'s mysteries and scandals.
18:17Join me at our new time,
18:208.30 p.m., weeknights, only on E!.
18:238.30 p.m. Nice.
18:26It's your thing
18:29Do what you want to do
18:32Do what you want to do
18:35I can't tell you
18:38Who to sock it to
18:45All right
18:51Go on, hamburger
18:56What do you call hamburgers that are grilled
19:00Every time by a person,
19:03absolutely delicious
19:10Karen came of age during a time
19:13that ushered in the winds of change,
19:16but still held the illusion of innocence.
19:19No one ever thought of anything going wrong.
19:22It was like you lived for the moment,
19:25you lived for the day.
19:29In her own place in the sun,
19:32the promising actress landed the role of Annie Sullivan
19:35in The Miracle Worker at the Laguna Beach Playhouse
19:38in the summer of 1962.
19:41I was floored, you know.
19:44I didn't realize that this wonderful person
19:47had all that talent besides.
19:50Yeah, she was very, very talented.
19:53But still, Karen struggled with low self-esteem
19:56Diet pills was pretty regular.
19:59I didn't know she was doing so many.
20:02I don't think any of us knew.
20:05In a town where despair is not an option,
20:08Karen hid hers well.
20:11But diet pills and sleeping aids
20:14were taking their toll on her mind and body.
20:17October 1st, 1962.
20:20Woke up feeling slightly nauseous and groggy.
20:24Aching limbs, stiff neck, surely liver damage
20:27resulted from pills.
20:30Two months later, Karen's diary noted an important date.
20:33December 4th, 1962.
20:36A rangy, good-looking 27-year-old actor
20:39named Andrew Pryne entered her life.
20:42I saw Karen and immediately was attracted to her.
20:45She was so bright looking and so beautiful.
20:48And there was an intelligence
20:52about her that was immediately apparent.
20:55Karen was captivated by Pryne's charisma.
20:58You're young. You're going to be young forever.
21:01You're going to be a star forever.
21:04There's not quite anything else hanging in the heavens like you.
21:07By February 1963, Karen's universe
21:10revolved around Andrew Pryne.
21:13She was very reliant upon me
21:16and I had to have more room.
21:19I was at that time in my career and my life
21:22when the world was open to me.
21:25I mean, in terms of young ladies,
21:28it was endless and wonderful.
21:31Karen's diary illustrated the fine line she walked
21:34between hope and dejection
21:37in her unpredictable relationship with Pryne.
21:40February 19th, 1963.
21:43Must maintain my own identity,
21:471963. Andy distant.
21:50Me terribly possessive and weak.
21:53I began to realize that she was taking pills,
21:56which I really didn't understand.
21:59And I must say, no credit to me,
22:02I was sort of impatient about it.
22:05I did not see deeply enough who she was
22:08and how lonely she was.
22:11Back in Chicago, Karen's mother was in the dark.
22:15And I can't understand why I didn't know more
22:18of what was happening.
22:21Karen's fragile emotional state spilled over
22:24into her professional life.
22:27If you are not a struggling actor,
22:30it's very difficult to impart to you
22:33what that's like and how scary that is.
22:36She worried very much about her weight,
22:39excessively so,
22:42because of the demands of the business.
22:45There is no forgiveness if you're overweight.
22:48There is no forgiveness if you're too old.
22:51There is no forgiveness if your nose doesn't look right.
22:54No one cares. And she knew that.
22:57She was getting that message.
23:00By the summer of 1963, Karen's unhealthy fixation
23:03on Pryne began to consume her life.
23:06If she knew he was going to be at a certain party
23:10It was very strange.
23:13Why she would do that?
23:16Because she wasn't nuts.
23:19She was very intelligent, very smart, very down to earth.
23:22But when it came to Andy, they were falling apart
23:25and she was pretty unhappy about it.
23:28So you do strange things.
23:31Coming up, Karen's desperation
23:34builds to a disturbing climax.
23:38I'm a person who's going to get hurt.
23:44Her life was a dangerous cocktail of sex.
23:47I knew she was a porn chick.
23:50Drugs.
23:53In the summer of 1963, Karen Kupcinit
23:56was struggling as an actress
23:59and distressed over a crumbling romance.
24:02As Karen's depression deepened,
24:05Why does my image of me have to be so aesthetic and perfect?
24:08What's the use of living with nothing to believe in?
24:11Have faith in?
24:18Despite personal setbacks,
24:21nothing prepared Karen Kupcinit for the unwelcome news
24:24she received in July 1963.
24:27The 22-year-old was pregnant.
24:30In those days, an abortion was a big deal.
24:34She had to go to Tijuana to do it
24:37and she almost bled to death on the way back.
24:40I think Mark and Marcia both were there
24:43and they drove her to Tijuana.
24:46She sure didn't want my parents to know about it.
24:49Karen recovered from the physical trauma of the abortion,
24:52but not from its far-reaching emotional effects.
24:55Andrew Pryne remained the unhealthy focus of Karen's life,
24:58friend Earl Holliman.
25:02She was pretty much what you think of as a victim.
25:05She had all the sensibilities of a person who's going to get hurt,
25:08in one way or another.
25:11A very sensitive girl, insecure,
25:14not knowing yet who she was,
25:19and desperately needing somebody to love her
25:22the way she wanted to be loved.
25:25Later that summer, Karen and Andrew
25:28received a series of anonymous death threat notes.
25:31They were predicting my death and terrible things.
25:34And it frightened me.
25:37And I went to the Hollywood police station, in fact,
25:40and showed them this and wanted a permit for a gun.
25:43And they just said, look, just forget it and go home.
25:46Pryne couldn't forget about the chilling notes.
25:49I took security measures in my house
25:52and in her apartment
25:55to sort of make us feel more secure
25:59that some nut was out there.
26:02The summer of 1963 passed without incident.
26:05In September, Karen moved to another apartment
26:08in West Hollywood
26:11and landed a guest spot on The Perry Mason Show.
26:14She still clung to Andrew Pryne.
26:17She'd stalk him and a couple of times she told me
26:20she'd gone to his apartment
26:23and opened the window and was peeking in on him.
26:27The 24th, 1963, I hid in the attic
26:30then sat outside in cold for 2 or 3 hours.
26:33Wish I were dead.
26:36On November 22nd, 1963,
26:39President John F. Kennedy was assassinated.
26:47I called Karen right away
26:50because I knew she would feel terrible.
26:53I had to get together with my buddy Earl Holliman.
26:56We all felt so terrible.
26:59We said, let's get out of here. Let's go somewhere.
27:02So we went to Palm Springs,
27:05never knowing it would be Karen's last weekend on Earth.
27:08It was a close time.
27:11That part of it was sweet.
27:14And we parted, friends.
27:17It was the last time Andrew Pryne saw Karen.
27:21On Thanksgiving, Karen had dinner
27:24with Mark and Marsha Goddard.
27:27She was crying. She was upset.
27:30She wanted to get her boyfriend back.
27:33She knew he was seeing another girl.
27:36She wanted to know what she could do,
27:39how she could get him back.
27:42We were trying to convince her to get on with her life.
27:45Karen returned home around 8.30 p.m.
27:49with her terrible friends.
27:52While the three watched television, Karen dozed off.
27:55Her friends left and were home by 11.30 p.m.
27:58Between 11.30 and midnight,
28:01Andrew Pryne called Karen.
28:04She seemed all right.
28:07I don't remember any details of the conversation.
28:10It wasn't dramatic.
28:13She was OK. She seemed OK.
28:16No one heard from Karen again.
28:27Three days later,
28:30at 7 p.m. on Saturday, November 30th,
28:33the Goddards discovered Karen's body.
28:36Within minutes, West Hollywood patrol officers arrived.
28:39I thought she took her own life
28:43because of her broken love affair with Andrew Pryne.
28:46Sheriff's detectives found 13 containers
28:49in Karen's medicine chest
28:52filled with diet pills and tranquilizers.
28:55The investigating officers
28:58contacted the Kupsonit family in Chicago.
29:01We were all pretty shaken up by it, obviously.
29:04My father and a couple of his friends flew out to L.A.,
29:07and he had to ID the body,
29:11Word of Karen's death spread quickly in Hollywood.
29:14As I walked in,
29:17they all turned and looked at me in a very shocked way.
29:20They said, What are you doing here?
29:23I said, What are you talking about?
29:26One of the guys took me aside and said,
29:29Don't you know that Karen Kupsonit was found dead?
29:32I was blown. My mind was blown.
29:35I couldn't get it.
29:38The coroner announced the cause of Karen's death,
29:41murder by strangulation.
29:44The estimated time of the murder
29:47was late Wednesday or early Thursday morning.
29:50I feel so sorry that I couldn't have talked to her that night.
29:53You never know what's going to happen,
29:56and you don't know if I had been there,
29:59if I had visited her over Thanksgiving,
30:02maybe something would have been different.
30:06We all feel so guilty about it because we weren't there,
30:09and because she was alone.
30:12Investigating officers began interviewing witnesses
30:15and potential suspects.
30:18Karen's former boyfriend, Andrew Pryne,
30:21was high on the list,
30:24but Pryne believed he had the key that could unlock her murder.
30:27I gave them the death threat notes,
30:30and they took them to the lab.
30:34I was completely stunned,
30:37not over what she had done,
30:40but over my lack of perception
30:43and insensitivity toward her.
30:46A 27-year-old male who lived in the apartment below Karen
30:49was also questioned,
30:52but there was no evidence to link him or anyone else
30:55to the crime scene.
30:58On December 4, 1963,
31:01the funeral of Karen Ann Kufcinit was held in Chicago.
31:04She was laid to rest, but there was no closure.
31:07Our feeling was bitter, bitter, absolutely bitter,
31:10because of the lack of a real thorough investigation.
31:13With no suspect in custody for Karen's murder,
31:16Pryne became an easy target of suspicion.
31:19This very well-dressed older lady that I didn't know
31:22looked at me and screamed,
31:25you murderer.
31:29She looked away from me, and she was terrified.
31:32She said, I'll hit you with this plate.
31:35And the whole room was staring at me in shock.
31:39Karen summed up the dark side of Hollywood
31:42in an eerie epitaph.
31:45It's an emotional industry,
31:48buying emotions, molding emotions, selling emotions.
31:51It's a woman, a bitch wearing cheap clothes,
31:54too much makeup, costumed jewelry, and rented furs.
31:58It's a town where actors pour their lifeblood into it,
32:01and then kill themselves because of it.
32:04In the years that followed, dead-end tips trickled in,
32:07psychics came and went,
32:10and investigators continued to question witnesses.
32:13Somewhere in the puzzle, a killer was free,
32:16and Karen Kufcinit's death remained a mystery.
32:23Coming up, a new theory
32:26I don't think Karen Kufcinit was murdered.
32:33I had no prior knowledge of the planned assault
32:36on Nancy Kerrigan.
32:39They wanted her.
32:43The murder of 22-year-old Karen Kufcinit
32:46has been shrouded in mystery for 36 years.
32:49In the spring of 1998,
32:53Keri Kufcinit was determined
32:56to unravel the facts of her aunt's death.
32:59Just having a broken hyoid bone
33:02is not in and of itself fatal.
33:08Through Karen Kufcinit's diaries and letters,
33:11Keri grew to love a woman she never met.
33:14Just like her Aunt Karen,
33:17Keri Kufcinit pursued an acting career.
33:20At the age of 27,
33:23Keri was no longer interested in the allure of Hollywood.
33:26She had a different goal.
33:29I decided to call the Sheriff's Department,
33:32the Unsolved Homicide Department,
33:35and see if there would be a way
33:38I could get into her file
33:41that I know has been very closed off
33:44to the public for 35 years.
33:48We decided to work with her in that regard
33:51because it is an unsolved case.
33:54And maybe with the attention that she would bring to the case,
33:57we might be able to come up with a new solution to it.
34:02Yarbrough put Keri in touch with someone else
34:05who had been captivated by the Karen Kufcinit story.
34:08Best-selling author and crime aficionado,
34:11James Elroy.
34:14It was, to me, the quintessential story
34:18of a man who was forced to be a movie star
34:21and finds death instead.
34:24He saw the story,
34:27and the story now is Cookie Through Keri's Eyes
34:30and how it affected Keri.
34:33Keri saw the road that many, many women went down.
34:36Keri saw that her aunt went down that road specifically
34:39and that it killed her.
34:42Keri was able to wrest change from Karen's tragedy.
34:45They find it impossible to understand
34:48why their daughter's case remains unsolved.
34:51They did a precursory investigation.
34:54They did the usual thing they have to do,
34:57but you got to go beyond that
35:00when you're dealing with a murder suspect,
35:03and they failed to do that.
35:06The facts of Karen's death are complex,
35:09and various theories abound on what may have happened
35:13and how Karen's death in this case is known to us.
35:16But whether it's murder, suicide, or accident
35:19is not so easily defined in this case.
35:22And that's what made it so difficult
35:25for them to determine any injury.
35:28Retired L.A. Sheriff's Homicide Detective Bill Stoner
35:31helped Keri sort through the voluminous murder files
35:34on Karen Kupcinat.
35:37I think when they first found her,
35:41they had all these empty pill vials.
35:44Her body was in a deep state of decomposition.
35:47The indication at the time was
35:50they couldn't determine any injury to the body.
35:53I am primarily a novelist,
35:56secondly a journalist.
35:59I've had my snout in the gutter of crime
36:02for over four decades,
36:05and my instincts say it's not a murder,
36:08but somebody held a gun to my head
36:11and I had to make a decision.
36:14Is this a homicide or an accidental death?
36:17I lean towards homicide.
36:20If this is truly a murder case, which I believe it is,
36:23then somebody in her social circle
36:26is the one who did the killing.
36:29The last week of her life,
36:32she had gone through 80-odd Dazoxyn pills.
36:36She could have fallen down while dancing around in the nude
36:39like a wood nymph to free her inhibitions,
36:42clipped her high-eyed bone,
36:45crawled up over on the couch right against this wall here,
36:48and died. Nobody heard anything.
36:51It could also be true that somebody
36:54re-entered or came into the apartment
36:57without her really realizing it
37:00and made some sexual advances
37:04and then rebuffed and immediately retaliated.
37:07They have actually done something overt
37:10to prevent her from becoming more vocal.
37:13So therefore, nobody heard anything.
37:16The high-eyed bone is right about here in the neck.
37:19When a person is strangled, it pops. It's a small bone.
37:22Karen Kupsnit's high-eyed bone was allegedly broken.
37:25A strong theory of sheriff's homicide at the time
37:28was that Dr. Harold Cade,
37:31the coroner who performed the autopsy on Karen,
37:34broke the high-eyed bone.
37:37If he knew that he broke that high-eyed bone and he lied about it,
37:40I don't see that happening.
37:43The role that drugs played in Karen's death may never be known.
37:46When it was called death by manual strangulation,
37:49right off the bat, they didn't test
37:52for the presence of the drugs that Karen Kupsnit had
37:55in her medicine chest.
37:59The motive behind the death threat notes that Karen sent to herself
38:02and Andrew Prine almost makes sense.
38:05She began to create
38:08not only a perception that she was a victim,
38:11but that they were victims together.
38:14And I think one could speculate that perhaps
38:17in her thinking, this would be a way
38:20to bond back with him.
38:23Confusing leads and misinformation,
38:27too many different ways to die.
38:30These are the facts that, for now,
38:33make the Karen Kupsnit case an enigma.
38:41Coming up, Kerry meets the man
38:44who was so much a part of Karen's life.
38:47I said, this is a very important moment.
38:57There is no simple explanation
39:00for the death of actress Karen Kupsnit.
39:03One fact is certain.
39:06The Kupsnit family carries a timeless portrait of Karen
39:09in their memories,
39:12that of a woman with the poetry of life
39:15and the power of beauty undiminished.
39:22Karen's story has a common thread
39:25with anyone who grieves over the sudden tragic loss
39:28of a loved one.
39:31It has happened to so many other people
39:34that getting her story out there
39:37maybe will touch somebody else
39:40that either this has happened to
39:43or they'll see how one person's death
39:46can affect someone that didn't even know her.
39:49This is a story that I don't think will ever be over.
39:53It's a story that has been developed
39:56by my sister's life.
39:59That to me is scary and it's wonderful
40:02because I love seeing parts of my sister in her.
40:05With the death of someone so young
40:08comes the speculation about what might have been.
40:11Think of the power that she could have developed
40:14if she ever reached a level of
40:17A, self-knowledge,
40:21and C, self-worth.
40:24She could have taken these obsessive drives,
40:27turned them back around
40:30and made something good out of herself.
40:33She was a gifted writer.
40:36I think that's why writers respond to her.
40:39It's not just the tragedy.
40:42I also think they sort of recognize
40:45a kind of kindred spirit when they see one.
40:48I think that if she had lived to be my age
40:51she would have been long over all of those
40:54and she probably would have been a lot happier
40:57with who she had become.
41:00In the fall of 1998, 27-year-old Carrie Kupcinet
41:03continued her search for the truth.
41:06Meeting Carrie Kupcinet was wonderful.
41:09All of a sudden the whole past comes forward
41:12and not all bad.
41:16It was a very important moment
41:19and we both were laughing and almost crying
41:22and she said, yeah, it is, it is.
41:25Karen's friends, barely able to grasp
41:28the magnitude of her death more than 3 decades ago,
41:31now have a deeper perspective.
41:34You don't really heal, you forget for a while
41:37and you go on and you lead all these different lives
41:40but when you start thinking about the person
41:44It's a spirit that's so strong that lives with me.
41:47So I was, you know...
41:50She's okay right now.
41:53She's in good hands.
41:56At the end of all of it or any of my self-pity
41:59or the rage against the injustices of the world
42:02all I could think was
42:05what a dreadful waste of a beautiful person.
42:08What a horrible waste.
42:11Perhaps one day the truth of what really happened in 1963
42:14will be uncovered.
42:17Until then, Karen's story lives on through her family.
42:20I keep thinking of her as a young girl.
42:23A child, in our view.
42:26A divine child.
42:33I don't really know where I'm headed with this in my life
42:36but I know that wherever I end up
42:40I know that she'll be there and I think she's guiding me there.
42:43Whatever the future holds
42:46Karen's words still ring true
42:49for those who dream of stardom
42:52in a mythical place called Hollywood.
42:55It's terribly difficult to keep your head clear
42:58in a town where the largest experts are make-believe,
43:01fantasy and unreal reality.
43:04The best way to keep from sinking
43:08is to do what you want to do with your personal career.
43:11To learn, to grow intellectually and to be realistic
43:14and to try to be objective about yourself.
43:37Uh...oh.