It is said the love of money is the root of all evil. Perhaps an addendum should read the more the money, the extra the evil.

With a net worth of $1.3 billion, Doris Duke was, according to the Forbes 400 List, the eighteenth wealthiest woman in America when she died at age eighty in 1993. Her death was attributed to natural causes, but the contended nefarious actions of several confidantes in her final days have led many to believe the heirless heiress was murdered and that her mucho moolah was the motive.

Doris Duke

Doris Duke was the only child of tobacco titan and hydroelectric power industrialist James “Buck”  Duke and Nanaline “Nanny” Holt Inman. Buck was the son of Washington Duke, who began the family’s tobacco empire and who provided the money for the expansion of Trinity College in his native Durham, North Carolina.

Following Buck Duke’s providing an additional endowment of $40 million to the school in 1924, it was renamed Duke University after his father.

Young Doris And Her Dad James ”Buck” Duke

Nanny Holt Duke

Doris Duke’s Mother

When her father died in October 1925, twelve-year-old Doris received $100 million, one-third of his money.

“The Wealthiest Little Girl In America” . . .

“The Wealthiest Little Girl in America” became an even wealthier young woman, as her father’s will bequeathed additional large inheritances when she turned twenty-one, twenty-five, and thirty.

. . . And An Even Wealthier Young Woman

In 1935, Doris Duke married James H. R. Cromwell. The stepson of (to almost anyone but his wife) wealthy financier Edward Stotesbury, he served as America’s Ambassador to Canada for several months in 1940 before resigning to run for a United States Senate seat. Cromwell’s campaign was funded by his wife’s fortune, but he was defeated by New Jersey incumbent William Barbour.

That same year, the couple had a daughter, Arden, who was born prematurely in Honolulu and died the following day. Three years later, after contentious legal proceedings, they divorced.

Doris Duke And James Cromwell

Doris worked briefly as a news correspondent in the 1940s before taking a $1 a year salary working a canteen for sailors in Egypt during World War II. After the war, she briefly reported from different cities across Europe as a foreign correspondent for the International News Service and wrote for Harper’s Bazaar.

The Globe-Trotting Heiress

To wed Porfirio Rubirosa in 1947, Doris paid his second wife, French actress Danielle Darrieux, $1 million to agree to an uncontested divorce. The Dominican Republic diplomat’s first wife, Flor, was the daughter of infamous dictator Rafael Trujillo, and Rubirosa was purported to be one of the strongman’s political assassins.

The heiress and the hitman were married for only thirteen months, during which time Doris gave Rubirosa several million dollars in gifts. The internationally known playboy received plenty more toys in the divorce settlement, including a seventeenth-century Paris house, a fishing fleet off Africa, several sports cars, a converted B-258 bomber, and a stable of polo ponies.

Doris With Second Husband Porfirio Rubirosa

Doris Duke twice tied the knot, but she had dozens of lovers, including movie star Errol Flynn, General George Patton, conservationist and writer Louis Bromfield, jazz pianist Joe Castro, and British politician Alec Cunningham-Reid.

While living in Hawaii, Doris Duke became the first non-native woman to take up competitive surfing under the tutelage of Olympic champion and another lover, Duke Kahanamoku.

The Dukes Of Hawaii

The uber-wealthy heiress maintained homes in Hawaii, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and the Falcon Lair Estate in Beverly Hills, California, purchased from silent screen star Rudolph Valentino in 1952.

Doris Duke’s Falcon Lair Estate

When Nanny Duke died in 1962, Doris inherited even more money– $250 million, the bulk of her mother’s estate. She used much of it to further expand her many charitable causes, including creating “Duke Gardens,” one of America’s largest indoor botanical displays on the grounds of her late father’s Hillsborough Township, New Jersey estate.

The heiress also established the Newport Restoration Foundation to preserve over eighty historic buildings and colonial homes in Newport, Rhode Island. Former first lady Jackie Kennedy Onassis was named Vice President of the organization and championed its causes.

Philanthropist

By the 1980s, Doris Duke’s philanthropic interests expanded into funding medical and AIDS research, as well as animal and child welfare. She also donated funds to support and educate disadvantaged black students in the south.

Additional Charitable Causes

Doris Duke’s wealth grew as she grew older, and so did her eccentricities. In 1988, at age seventy-five and with her fortune eclipsing over $1 billion, she legally adopted Charlene Heffner, the sister of the third wife of billionaire investor Nelson Peltz. After having not expressed any interest in being a mother since the death of her infant daughter nearly half-a-century earlier, the heiress told friends she believed the thirty-five-year-old Hare Krishna was Arden reincarnated.

Following the completion of the adoption process, Charlene Heffner legally changed her name to Chandi Duke Heffner. Her new old mother named her as the executor of her will, but they soon had a falling out, the nature of which is unclear.

In 1990, Doris Duke disinherited and disowned Chandi Heffner, negated the adoption, and removed her from her will, stating she no longer wanted her to financially profit from the adoption.

Chandi Heffner And Her Adopted Mother

The heiress replaced her adopted daughter with her longtime friend, Doctor Harry Demopoulos. The heir tenure of the self-professed longevity specialist was brief, as he was supplanted by her accountant and business manager Irwin Bloom in November 1991. Within the year, however, he too was given the boot.

Dr. Harry Demopoulos

When the tobacco heiress finally seemed to settle on a choice, one of the declared executors shocked many of those close her.

In an April 1992 codicil to her will, Doris Duke named two people as co-executors: her half-nephew, Walker Inman, and her butler, Bernard Lafferty. The former was no surprise, but the latter was a shock to many.

Doris Again Amends Her Will

Hailing from Ireland, the forty-six-year-old Lafferty had come to America as a virtual illiterate, but he found work as a maitre d’ in Philadelphia. He had tended to several starlets including Sophia Loren, Elizabeth Taylor, and Peggy Lee, the latter of whom spoke highly of him.

Lafferty had also previously worked for Chandi’s sister, Claudia, the wife of Nelson Peltz. Chandi hired him to work for her soon-to-be adoptive mother in 1987 after he had been fired by another employer because of his excessive drinking, a problem which continued while he worked for the heiress.

Many acquaintances say Lafferty was Doris Duke’s closest confidante, but others contend she loathed the alcoholic and had only hired him because of his connection to Chandi.

Bernard Lafferty

Within days of naming Lafferty as co-executor, the seventy-nine-year-old Doris announced she wished to have cosmetic surgery. Lafferty referred her to renowned Beverly Hills surgeon Dr. Harry Glassman, the husband, at the time, of actress Victoria Principal.

Two days after the surgery, a highly-medicated Doris fell at her Beverly Hills home and broke her hip. Dr. Glassman referred her to Dr. Charles Kivowitz, who became her primary physician.

Dr. Harry Glassman

Over the following year, Doris Duke’s mental and physical health deteriorated. She was suffering from severe bouts of confusion, and she was hospitalized several times with a variety of physical ailments.

In January 1993, Doris underwent knee replacement surgery for which she was hospitalized at Los Angeles’ Cedars-Sinai Medical Center until April 15. In March, she again altered her will by cutting out her half-nephew, Walter Inman, and naming Bernard Lafferty as the sole executor. The changes were drawn up by William Doyle, an attorney recommended by Dr. Glassman and who were associated with Dr. Kivowitz.

Doris’ Health Worsens

As executor, Lafferty would receive a fee of roughly $5 million and a bequest of $500,000 a year for life. He was also given power of attorney and control of his employer’s multiple charitable foundations slated to receive the bulk of her fortune upon her death. The remaining several million dollars not earmarked for endowments would be appropriated for the butler.

Lafferty was also authorized to appoint the bank that would serve as the estate’s co-executor and to pay the fees and divide the commissions among the trustees as he deemed fit. He appointed the U.S. Trust Company as corporate co-executor. The only trustee named in Doris Duke’s will was Marion Oates Charles, her longtime summer friend and neighbor in Newport, Rhode Island.

Lafferty Gains Sole Power Of the Estate

In late March 1993, Chandi Heffner sued her former adoptive mother for breach of contract, claiming she had promised her a life of luxury as the principal heir of her estate.

Chandi Sues Her Former Second Mom

One week later, on April 5, four people witnessed the official signing of Doris Duke’s last will: Dr. Charles Kivowitz, lawyer William Doyle, her housekeeper Ann Bostich, and her personal chef, Colin Shanley. The signing occurred as she lay in bed at Cedars-Sinai Hospital.

Bostich and Shanley believe the heavily-medicated and barely awake Doris did not know what she was doing when she signed the papers and say Doyle had to guide her hand for them to be signed.

The lawyer and doctor both dispute the accusation. In sworn depositions, they are adamant that Doris was coherent, of sound mind, and that she signed the papers of her own volition.

                                     Ann Bostich                    Colin Shanley

Doris Duke’s Former Housekeeper And Personal Chef

Within weeks, Lafferty had spent over $100,000 on a variety of items, including upscale clothing, jewelry, and a new Cadillac. All the purchases were charged to the Doris Duke Estate.

The Bumbling Butler Goes On A Spending Spree

In July 1993, three months after the final version of her will was signed and witnessed, Doris Duke underwent a second knee surgery. A day after returning to her Falcon Lair home, she suffered a severe stroke. After two months in the hospital, she returned home, where her bedroom was converted into an intensive care unit with twenty-four-hour nursing supervision.

Saying her medical situation was terminal, Dr. Kivowitz began injecting Doris with Demerol, a powerful synthetic opioid pain medication, on October 7. Nine days later, he administered the drug by continuous drip instead of by injection. Contending the heiress was in intense pain from a build-up of fluid in her lungs and barely clinging to life, he began administering ten milligrams of morphine by intravenous push in place of Demerol on the evening of October 26.

On the following day, a package from a drug company was delivered to Falcon Lair. Though it was addressed to one of the six nurses tending to Doris, Colin Shanley says Lafferty took it to another room as if it were his. That evening, Ann Bostich and two nurses claim they heard Lafferty say, “Ms. Duke is going to die tonight.”

Doris Is Barely Alive

At 4:00 a.m. on October 28, Dr. Kivowitz increased the morphine another ten milligrams in conjunction, according to a nurse, with another dose of Demerol. He said his patient was in an advanced state of pulmonary edema, a fluid buildup in her lungs.

Another nurse recorded that a one-hundred milligram dose of Demerol was added to the morphine drip by “telephone order of Dr. Glassman per Dr. Kivowitz” at 5:15 a.m.

Dr. Charles Kivowitz

(2009 Photo)

An hour later, Doris Duke passed away at age eighty. A spokesman announced her death was caused by pulmonary congestion resulting in cardiac arrest. The heiress had amended her will multiple times, but she not had wavered on her wishes regarding what would happen after her passing. She requested that no funeral or memorial service be held for her and asked to be buried at sea.

Within twenty-four hours of her death, Doris Duke was cremated. Her ashes were scattered over the Pacific Ocean three weeks later.

Doris Duke’s Final Day

In a January 1995 affidavit, twenty-eight-year-old Tammy Payette, one of the six nurses tending to Doris Duke in her final days, claims it was unnecessary for Dr. Kivowitz to administer the Demerol and the morphine because his patient was not in pain. In addition to Doris’ request to return to the hospital being disregarded, Payette contends the heiress did not have pulmonary edema, that the morphine caused her kidneys to fail and her circulation to weaken, and that she was placed on heavy sedation only on Lafferty’s orders.

Payette’s claims lost credibility after she was convicted of stealing nearly $800,000 in jewelry and other valuables from several critically ill wealthy patients while tending to them in their homes from 1993-95. One of her victims was Max Factor, president of the namesake cosmetics empire founded by his father, who she began working for within days of Doris Duke’s death.

In February 1996, Tammy Payette was sentenced to eight years in prison and ordered to pay $400,000 in restitution on the estimated worth of the valuables not recovered. She was paroled after serving three-and-a-half years.

Tammy Payette

Payette was found to have had three pearl and diamond necklaces confirmed to have belonged to Doris Duke. She denies stealing them, saying Bernard Lafferty gave her the items to keep her quiet over her suspicions of his involvement in the heiress’s death. Lafferty denied giving her the jewelry.

Payette Accuses Lafferty

Doris Duke’s death was attributed to natural causes, but many of her employees and other associates share Tammy Payette’s belief the wealthy heiress was methodically murdered by several people seeking to obtain a chunk of her fortune. The conspiracy, they contend, was headed by her butler, Bernard Lafferty, carried out by her doctor, Charles Kivowitz, and aided by multiple lawyers.

Ann Bostich and Colin Shanley, Doris Duke’s former housekeeper and personal chef, believe Lafferty manipulated the elderly heiress into appointing him as executor of her estate so that he could reap her riches. Their civil lawsuit against him for harassment and breach of contract, however, was dismissed.

Another civil lawsuit filed by three other former Duke servants alleges that Lafferty had discussed killing three rivals for the estate, including Doris’ estranged daughter, Chandi Heffner. It too was dismissed.

Lafferty Is Accused But Never Prosecuted

In the following two years after Doris Duke’s death, Lafferty’s alcoholism worsened. While driving drunk on the evening of June 2, 1995, he struck a light pole and four cars before crashing into Hollywood’s Whisky a Go Go nightclub. He was also later forcibly admitted to two hospitals for treatment.

Bernard Lafferty inherited over $6 million from Doris Duke’s estate before dying of a heart attack in November 1996 at age fifty-one.

The Butler Cashes In Before Checking Out

Six civil lawsuits in total challenging Doris Duke’s will were filed; all were dismissed.

The Heiresses Final Will Is Upheld

From a law enforcement perspective, the debated death of Doris Duke would be a closed case but for the fact that it had ever been open. The Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office found no credible evidence of foul play.

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/5586/doris-duke

Was Doris Duke Drugged To Death?

Despite Doris Duke’s negating the adoption of Chandi Heffner in her final will, her onetime legal daughter received $65 million in a settlement.

Chandi Comes Out All Right

Many believe Doris Duke was murdered; some believe she herself may have gotten away with murder twenty-seven years earlier.

On October 7, 1966, staff members at Duke’s Rough Point Estate in Newport, Rhode Island, heard a loud argument between the heiress and Eduardo Tirella, the curator of her art holdings. Tirella had told friends he was going to tell his employer he was quitting to pursue a career as a production designer in Hollywood.

Both Duke and Tirella entered a rented Dodge Polara, driven by Tirella according to her, and proceeded to leave the estate. After stopping the vehicle with the transmission in park and the parking brake engaged, Duke said Tirella exited the car to open the gate to the estate.  She said she then moved from the passenger seat to the driver’s seat to drive the car forward and pick up Tirella once the gate was open. In so doing, she released the parking brake and shifted into drive, but mistakenly put her foot on the gas instead of the brake pedal. She claimed the car pinned Tirella against the still-opening gate, knocked it over, struck a tree, and trapped him under the car.

Medical respondees pronounced the forty-two-year-old Tirella dead at the scene. The Newport police ruled the death accidental, but Duke was found negligible in civil court for wrongful death. Tirella’s family sought $1.2 million, but was awarded only $75,000.

In a 2020 Vanity Fair article, journalist and Newport native Peter Lance wrote that Doris Duke’s account of the incident changed multiple times and that none were consistent with the evidence at the scene. He and several other investigators believe she likely, in a fit of rage over Tirella’s decision to no longer work for her, deliberately ran the car over him.

Eduardo Tirella and Doris Duke;

 Did the Heiress Kill The Curator?

If Doris Duke was murdered, the means was through the injection of unnecessary drugs. In 1982, she threw a party for her Newport, Rhode Island, neighbor Claus von Bülow following the Danish-born British lawyer and socialite’s second conviction of the attempted murder of his wife, Sunny, by injecting her with an overdose of insulin.

Von Bülow’s first conviction was overturned on appeal as was his latter conviction. He was retried and acquitted of the crime.

Claus von Bülow

In November 1988, one week before Doris Duke adopted Chandi Heffner, she had posted the $5,000,000 bail for former Imelda Marcos after her arrest for racketeering. The heiress also lent the former Philippine First Lady another $5 million to cover her legal expenses.

Doris And Imelda

Doris Duke and Barbara Hutton, two of the wealthiest women in America for many years, were born ten days apart. Much to each’s chagrin, the respective heiresses were frequently compared to one another.

In 1953, two years after divorcing Doris, Porfirio Rubirosa wed Hutton, heiress to the Woolworth retail chain fortune. Their marriage lasted only fifty-three days.

The Respective “Poor Little Rich Girls”

The Doris Duke Foundation is dedicated to medical research, prevention of cruelty to children and animals, the performing arts, wildlife, and ecology.

The tobacco heiress also cultivated an extensive art collection, principally of Islamic and Southeast Asian art. The works are publicly displayed at her former Honolulu, Hawaii, home, now known as the Doris Duke Foundation for Islamic Art.

Her Legacy Lives On

 

SOURCES:

• Chicago Tribune
• Daily News Archives
  • Los Angeles Times
• New York Times
• Newsweek
• Vanity Fair