Imitation SHAME
Robert Chambers couldn’t act perfect forever...
With his movie star looks, smart attire and bad-boy demeanour, everyone wanted to be friends with Robert Chambers.
Robert, 19, attended the best schools and hung out with the rich offspring from some of New York’s finest families.
But in reality, Robert was an addict who stole from people to buy drugs and didn’t care who he hurt.
Unlike most of his peers, Robert didn’t come from a wealthy background.
He lived with his mum, Phyllis, who worked all hours as a nurse to get her son into private schools for a life of privilege.
Off the back of scholarships, Robert attended several prestigious prep schools.
His background made him different, but other students accepted him because of his charm – and his access to drugs.
To feed his expensive cocaine habit, Robert would break in to luxury New York homes, and steal jewellery and cash. He was disruptive, rebellious and skipped classes to party.
His behaviour and bad grades saw
him expelled from several schools.
Eventually, Robert graduated and went to college, but he only lasted one semester there before he was asked to leave.
Instead of turning his life around, Robert stole a friend’s credit card and went on a spending spree.
His mum would stop the owner from pressing charges.
That would change the course of one young woman’s future.
On August 25, 1986, Robert was drinking with friends at Dorrian’s Red Hand, a swanky bar in Manhattan that attracted the young and rich.
While there, he bumped into Jennifer Levin, 18.
They’d been on a couple of dates and Jennifer was intrigued by the rebel. Jennifer, the daughter of a successful real estate agent, was the opposite of Robert. She was intelligent, ambitious and was about to go to college where she would have excelled. Drinkers saw the pair leave the bar together at 4am. At 6.20am, a cyclist came across a body of a partially-clothed woman in Central Park, under a large elm tree. It was Jennifer. There were cuts, scratches and bruises on her neck, indicating that she’d been strangled.
Police went to see Robert, as he was the last person to be seen with her.
He wasn’t a suspect at all – until he appeared with fresh scratch marks down both sides of his face.
When asked, Robert said his cat had scratched him. But when he was
brought in for questioning, he admitted he’d killed Jennifer. But said it was an accident. ‘I didn’t mean to hurt her. I liked her very much,’ he said.
Incredibly, Robert went on to blame Jennifer for her own death.
Robert said that at the park, they had started to be intimate, but Jennifer forced herself on him.
‘She’s having her way with me, without my consent, with my hands behind my back, hurting me,’ he insisted to police.
He said it was ‘rough sex’ that was against his will and he’d struck Jennifer to make her stop.
She was hit in the neck and fell to the ground.
But Jennifer’s injuries were not consistent with a single blow.
There were scratches on Robert’s chest, injuries on her body and evidence of a prolonged strangulation and violent struggle.
Their tryst in the park had gone horribly wrong.
Had he forced himself on her? Had they argued?
Robert was charged with second degree murder but was released on bail and spent two years waiting for trial.
During that time, a video was leaked to the press of Robert holding up a doll at a party, pretending to strangle it.
‘Oops! I think I killed it,’ he joked to the camera.
The press soon dubbed him the ‘Preppy Killer’ because of his schooling.
And incredibly, at the 1988 trial, the prestigious world he’d become part of seemed
to fall in his favour.
Robert was portrayed as the handsome altar boy who had simply defended himself, while Jennifer’s reputation was attacked.
She was tarnished as promiscuous and incredibly, headlines at the time included: How
Jennifer Courted Death and Sex Play Got Rough.
Jennifer had a journal that the court referred to as a little black book of sexual encounters.
Her horrified mum, Ellen, was disgusted that her daughter was being blamed for her own death.
Robert was 6ft 5in and double the weight of 5ft 4in Jennifer.
At no point could she have overpowered him.
Instead, she’d been the one helpless with her clothes pushed up.
The jury heard that after Robert had killed Jennifer, he stayed in Central Park, watching the body until it was discovered. He only left
when police told him to move on, and he went home to bed. If it had been an accident like he said, why hadn’t Robert done CPR or called 911? But all the talk of reputations muddied the water, and after nine days of deliberation, the jury couldn’t make a decision. Robert’s team made a deal. He pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter – a big step down from murder.
In doing so, it was a legal admittance on his part that he had intended to hurt Jennifer when he killed her.
But the lack of a real explanation of what happened was hard for Jennifer’s loved ones to accept.
Even the sentence of five to 15 years was lenient for a man who had coldly taken a life.
Again, it felt like the law was saying that Jennifer had brought it on herself. Truly shocking. While behind bars, Robert had the chance to turn his life around, but even there, he couldn’t hide his true colours. He was disruptive and rebellious. Over the years, he assaulted an officer, was found with drugs and had almost 30 disciplinary violations for everything from weapon possession to disobeying orders. Robert was even moved to another prison and spent five years in solitary confinement. Along with a complete lack of remorse, it meant that he was continually denied parole and served the maximum 15 years. Meanwhile, Jennifer’s family filed a civil wrongful death lawsuit against Robert that resulted in him owing the family $25million. He was ordered to pay them any lump sums he could, including 10 percent of any future earnings, until the money was paid in full.
Jennifer’s family said any money would go to victims’ rights charities.
In 2003, Robert, then 36, was released from prison into a media circus.
Unlike Jennifer, he had a chance at a future.
But his weakness for drugs and his disregard for authority saw him repeatedly arrested.
Finally in 2008, Robert was sentenced to 19 years in prison for selling drugs from his flat.
His earliest release date will be in 2024.
At the time, Jennifer’s mum told reporters: ‘He got more time in prison for selling drugs than for murdering my daughter.’
Robert, now 52, has found himself back in prison.
No matter how he dressed, who he befriended or what prep school he attended, Robert Chambers simply couldn’t hide his true nature.