BETTER TIMES: The late Mary Richardson Kennedy and husband Robert Kennedy Jr. appear comfortable in 2010 at their Westchester property full of historic political memorabilia. (Grant Delin/Corbis Define)
Her Camelot goals had been falling aside.
Mary Richardson Kennedy was deep in credit-card debt and getting hammered in divorce courtroom when she hanged herself in a barn on her Westchester property, pals and paperwork revealed yesterday.
Robert Francis Kennedy Jr. slapped the mom of his 4 youngsters with a number of restraining orders, making an attempt to get full custody of the youngsters — all whereas he publicly changed her along with his actress girlfriend, Cheryl Hines.
“He was kicking her whereas she’s down, on their own on this home that she constructed,” an in depth buddy mentioned. “In the long run, the whole lot was simply an excessive amount of.”
And debt collectors had been respiration down her neck.
American Categorical filed a civil swimsuit in opposition to Mary in Westchester on April 16, an astounding revelation for somebody whose husband has entry to the Kennedy belief fund.
A determined Mary, 52, feared she’d lose the whole lot: her children, her monetary independence and the sprawling property that she had appointed like a presidential museum.
“He was going for full custody of the youngsters, which broke her coronary heart. She additionally had been a part of the Kennedy household for 30 years. And now she was being forged apart by them,” a second household buddy mentioned.
She fell deep into despair — abusing alcohol and pharmaceuticals — threatening suicide so usually that the household staged an intervention, one other buddy mentioned.
She even tried AA conferences, however usually relapsed, family and friends mentioned.
“There have been instances when she needed to be taken to the hospital when she could be appearing irrationally and threatening to harm herself,” a supply mentioned.
Sister-in-law Kerry Kennedy mentioned Mary — a lifelong buddy — had been sober for 5 months, however was nonetheless battling despair.
“She fought with each ounce of her mission to beat that horrible illness,” Kerry Kennedy instructed The New York Occasions.
“It was not one thing that she requested for; it was one thing that she was dealt.”
Regardless of the claims of Mary’s pals, an exhausted RFK Jr. had solely type phrases for his tormented, estranged spouse.
“A variety of instances I don’t know the way she made it via the day. She was in a whole lot of agony for lots of her life. I don’t assume anybody who was round her didn’t do the whole lot that they might to assist her,” he instructed the Occasions.
Calling Mary “extraordinary,” he mentioned, “She was a great one who didn’t deserve the type of ache she needed to reside with.”
Kennedy mentioned that, opposite to studies, his spouse didn’t go away a suicide notice.
Courtroom data present Kennedy relentlessly constructed a case in opposition to Mary of their custody battle.
Kennedy, 58 — the son of the late Sen. Robert F. Kennedy — filed non permanent restraining orders in opposition to Mary {that a} Westchester choose signed on March 28, April 19 and once more final Friday, paperwork present.
He additionally filed an order of safety final September and acquired one other choose to carry her in contempt of courtroom later that month.
The 2 had been due again on Aug. 10. A four-day trial scheduled for September may have resulted in her dropping custody. Information within the case are sealed.
Mary additionally feared getting booted from her property on South Bedford Street in Mount Kisco — a ten,000-square foot, Nineteen Twenties farmhouse that was absolutely renovated in 2007 to be a mannequin of “eco-friendly” constructing.
Mary, an architect who gave up her profession to lift her household, took cost of each element, certainly one of her pals mentioned.
The ten.4-acre, $4 million property boasts a museum-quality assortment of presidential memorabilia that features a Franklin Roosevelt marketing campaign banner and Sen. Robert Kennedy’s assortment of presidential signatures relationship again to George Washington, pals and brokers mentioned.
Kennedy and his first spouse, Emily Ruth Black, purchased the house in 1985, city data present.
After they divorced in 1994, Mary paid Black $500,000 and have become a co-owner of the home with Kennedy. Information present a $500,000 dwelling fairness line on the home.
“She was going to have to depart her dwelling, the house that she constructed and made utterly eco-friendly, and the place would she go?” one other buddy mentioned.
Mary additionally felt publicly embarrassed as Kennedy carried on his high-profile romance with “Curb Your Enthusiasm” star Hines, sources mentioned.
“She confronted dropping her children, and his relationship with Cheryl Hines was humiliating. At an occasion final month, he walked the crimson carpet with Cheryl as a pair and took the youngsters,” a supply mentioned of the Riverkeeper Annual Fisherman’s Ball in late April.
“She liked him. Her household and her dwelling [were] her coronary heart and soul,” the primary household buddy mentioned.
“Even after they separated, she was pretending the whole lot was wonderful. She’d nonetheless name him her husband. It was weird and unhappy.”
Their youngsters — Conor, 18, Kyra, 17, William, 15, and 11-year-old Aiden — weren’t at dwelling when their mom hanged herself.
Kennedy stopped briefly on the property yesterday earlier than returning to hitch household and pals at a two-story manse a couple of mile away, the place he has been dwelling with the couple’s two youngest children whereas the older ones are away in school.
Mary’s wake is scheduled for in the present day at Bobby Kennedy’s close by dwelling. The funeral will likely be held tomorrow at St. Patrick’s Church in Bedford. She’ll be buried in Hyannisport.
Extra reporting by Erin Calabrese, Jennifer Gould Keil, Dan MacLeod and Selim Algar
