‘Evil’ murderer with Hawaii ties dies in prison cell

NEW YORK » Former Hawaii resident Sante Kimes, who along with her son made up a notorious grifter team convicted of the murders of a wealthy widow in New York and a businessman in Los Angeles, has died in her prison cell at age 79.

"I hope that there’s room in hell for her," Hono­lulu attorney Jeffrey Portnoy said Tuesday.

Portnoy, in a 2000 Hono­lulu Star-Bulletin interview upon Kimes’ murder conviction, described her as "diabolical, sinister, evil and manipulative."

Portnoy represented an insurance company in the Hawaii arson and slavery cases involving Kimes, and appeared on NBC’s "Dateline" in 1998.

Kimes, who was portrayed by Mary Tyler Moore in a TV movie, died Monday night after being found unresponsive at the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility in Westchester County, said Linda Foglia, spokes­woman for the state Department of Corrections.

Once Kimes was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment, Portnoy said he was no longer concerned for his own safety.

"But up until that time, knowing who she was, how evil she was, her propensity for violence and what I had heard happened to missing people, including missing lawyers, I wouldn’t say I was looking behind my back every time, but I always knew there was potential that she or her son could do something bad," he said. "And they ultimately did and got caught."

In 2000 Kimes and her son, Kenneth Kimes Jr., were convicted of murder in connection with the disappearance of Irene Silverman, an 82-year-old widow and former Radio City Music Hall Rockette.

Authorities said the Kimeses conspired to steal Silverman’s $7 million Manhattan townhouse and other possessions, and her body has never been found.

At the time of the Kimeses’ sentencing, authorities said Kenneth Kimes strangled Silverman, and then he and his mother put her body in garbage bags and disposed of it somewhere only they knew. A police search of their car and luggage found guns, a knockout liquid, plastic handcuffs, fright masks, syringes, tapes of Silverman’s telephone conversations and a fake deed to Silverman’s home.

Sante Kimes was sentenced to 120 years in prison and would not have been eligible for parole until 2119. Her son received 125 years.

She lived in Hawaii with her husband, Kenneth Kimes Sr., for 12 years beginning in the early 1970s. While here the couple’s homes burned twice in blazes that fire investigators said were set deliberately.

In 1985 an 18-year-old domestic worker accused the Kimeses of imprisoning her in their Portlock home.

The Kimeses were convicted of violating federal anti-slavery laws in Hawaii and Las Vegas and sentenced to five years in prison. Kenneth Kimes Sr. died in 1994.

Portnoy represented an insurance company in the arson cases and in a lawsuit when Sante Kimes tried to get her insurance company to provide her a lawyer in the slavery case.

In 2004 Kimes was convicted in Cali­for­nia of murder in the 1998 death of businessman David Kazdin, whose body was found in a trash bin, and she was later sentenced to life in prison.

Kenneth Kimes Jr., who pleaded guilty in 2003, also was sentenced to life in prison. He said his mother planned Kazdin’s killing and sent him to do the job. He testified that he shot Kazdin in the back of the head at close range and that someone he found at a homeless shelter helped him dispose of the body.

He said his mother decided to kill Kazdin, an old friend, after Kazdin found out that she had taken out a $280,000 loan by forging his signature.

Sante Kimes’ criminal past also included a 1986 conviction for illegally transporting Mexican girls and keeping them as prisoners and household slaves in her Las Vegas home.

The made-for-TV movie about the Kimeses, "Like Mother Like Son: The Strange Story of Sante and Kenny Kimes," featured Gabriel Olds as the son.