True story of socialite Claus von Bulow accused of trying to murder his heiress wife as scandal becomes TV series

Daily Mail​

5 days ago

Apple is working on a limited series about late socialite Claus von Bulow, who was famously accused of trying to murder his wife Sunny in the early '80s.
According to Deadline, the prestige streamer already has British playwright Jack Thorne attached to the project.
Thorne was most recently behind Netflix 's psychological crime drama Adolescence, which won universal acclaim from critics and became one of the most-watched Netflix shows of all time.
The Danish-born Bulow was found guilty of the attempted murder of his heiress wife in a 1982 trial before being acquitted in 1985 following a second trial.
The second trial was televised, making it the first major criminal trial in the United States to be broadcast live on television.
He was accused of using insulin injections to try to kill the heiress so that he could get his hands on her $100million fortune, which she had inherited from her Pittsburgh utilities magnate father George Crawford, who died when she was just three.
Mrs Bulow was first found unresponsive in one of the many bathrooms at their Rhode Island home while celebrating Christmas with her family in 1979.
She slipped into a coma and was rushed to hospital, where she was miraculously revived.
Doctors determined that the coma was the result of low blood sugar and diagnosed her as hypoglycemic.
The following Christmas she was found unconscious again, but this time she had suffered severe enough brain injury to fall into a persistent vegetative state.
The socialite ended up in a coma that lasted for the rest of her life, up until her death in 2008.
In a sensational trial, her husband was accused of trying to murder her - being first found guilty, then dramatically cleared.
Mrs Bulow's children from her first marriage to Prince Alfred von Auersperg hired private investigators to find out if Mr Bulow was behind what happened to their mother.
He was charged in 1982, but released on $1million bail.
Mr Bulow was found guilty in 1982 and sentenced to 30 years in jail.
Just three years later, the verdict was thrown out and a retrial took place.
Mr Bulow hired celebrity attorney Alan Dershowitz, who would later defend O.J. Simpson and Jeffrey Epstein, to get his conviction overturned.
Celebrities took the stand to speak in Mr Bulow's defense, including writer Truman Capote, and a media firestorm ensued.
According to Dershowitz, one prosecutor on the case said, 'This case has everything. It has money, sex, drugs; it has Newport, New York and Europe; it has nobility; it has maids, butlers, a gardener.'
After being freed, Mrs Bulow's children had Mr Bulow removed from their mother's will and left him without a penny.
Only the couple's biological daughter, Cosima, stood by him and he denounced any entitlements in favor of her being able to equally share assets with her half siblings.
Mr Bulow was able to divorce Mrs Bulow in 1988, while she was still comatose.
Their Manhattan apartment and Newport mansion were turned over to the von Auersperg children from her previous marriage.
Dershowitz went on to write a book about the trial which was turned into 1990 film Reversal Of Fortune, starring Jeremy Irons as Mr Bulow and Glenn Close as his wife.
The film was enormous hit, earning rave reviews from critics and winning Irons the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1991.
After his acquittal, Mr Bulow moved to London and became a fixture on the social scene.
He died in his London home in 2019 at age 92.