The witness list for the trial of socialite Brooke Astor’s son might have been ripped from the Social Register.
David Rockefeller, Barbara Walters and Henry and Nancy Kissinger are among the prominent figures who may be called to testify at the trial of Anthony D. Marshall.
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So may Annette de la Renta, the wife of designer Oscar de la Renta, and former United Nations boss Kofi Annan and his wife, Nane.
Others on the list given to potential jurors Tuesday include Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter, New York Public Library chief Paul LeClerc, novelist Louis Auchincloss and Philippe de Montebello, former head of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Brooke Astor
“That is the circle that Brooke Astor traveled in,” Assistant District Attorney Joel Seidemann told the panel which will decide whether Marshall is guilty of stealing millions from his mother before her death two years ago at age 105.
Seidemann said he wanted to make sure they would not be too star struck to focus on their deliberations.
Kissinger, 85, Walters, 77, Rockefeller, 93, and De la Renta, 69, were close friends of Astor, New York’s leading philanthropist and unofficial first lady. They are expected to be asked about her mental state during her final years, how her son treated her and what they know about what he planned to do with her money when she died.
Marshall, 84, is charged with fraud, conspiracy and grand larceny and faces 25 years behind bars if convicted at his trial, which could last three months.
Prosecutors allege he stole more than $60 million from his mother, who was stricken with Alzheimer’s disease in her final years.
They argue she wanted to leave her money to the institutions to which she had devoted her life, including the Met and the public library, but that Marshall conned her into changing her will to enrich himself and his wife.
Co-defendant Francis Morrissey, a lawyer Marshall hired, is charged with conspiracy and forgery for allegedly faking Astor’s signature on the updated will.
The two men say they are innocent, and will argue Astor was lucid at the time the will was changed.
It is the lesser known names on the witness list – among them, Astor’s former butler, nurses, chauffeur and gardeners – who are expected to provide some of the most damning testimony, according to the New York Daily News.
One nurse, Pearline Noble, kept a diary in which she used code names to describe people in Astor’s life – including “Miss Piggy” for Marshall’s wife, Charlene, prosecutors said.
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