Two Kissels, Two Murders
Funeral services were held over the weekend for real estate mogul Andrew Kissel. The millionaire was found brutally murdered last week in his home in Greenwich, Conn., one of the wealthiest communities in the country.
As co-anchor Hannah Storm reported for The Early Show, Kissel, 46, was facing at least 10 years in prison for real estate fraud, and his marriage was failing. His wife had left him just two days before the murder, taking his two daughters with her.
In his most desperate hour, Kissel had turned to divorce attorney Howard Graber for help.
"My initial reaction, and it's still what I believe today, is that if the allegations were true about him stealing from people that he simply stole from the wrong person or people," Graber told Storm. "I was not shocked."
Kissel was brutally stabbed to death; his body was discovered in the basement of the mansion he was renting. Adding to the sensational quality of the crime, it was the second headline-grabbing murder suffered by the wealthy Kissel family. Less than three years ago, Kissel's brother Robert died in Hong Kong in a notorious crime known as the "milkshake murder."
A private investigator who worked for Robert Kissel talked to Storm about the case. "Just stunning how in a three-year period just this complete tragedy of the deterioration of this family," said Frank Shea. "I, personally, have never seen anything like this and I don't even think a movie could be written like this."
It was Shea who broke the news to Robert that his wife was having an affair — and worse. "It was early September, I booked a flight to Hong Kong, and we sat down at the China Club in Hong Kong and I told him that I believed his wife was trying to kill him," he told Storm.
A suspicion that came true. Nancy Kissel was convicted of drugging Robert with a spiked milkshake, then bludgeoning him to death. A close friend of Robert Kissel's, Michael Paradise, spoke exclusively to Storm about one of the details of the case, that Mrs. Kissel had one of the couple's children deliver the milkshake to her husband. Paradise said he was "shocked, dismayed that a mother would allow her children to deliver a death potion to their father."
But Paradise said he experienced another side of the family, and that at "most Kissel family celebrations, there were a lot of smiles."
And he remembered a man who seemed to have such a bright future.
"He was living the life of Reilly. He was a managing director at the largest brokerage firm in the world covering Asia, traveling all over the world," he said. "It just seemed that he had everything to live for ... He was a good man and he did not deserve what he got."
As for Andrew Kissel's murder, investigators are looking for a break in the case and say they still have no suspects. And Paradise says the two murders should be in no way compared.
"You can't tie the two together," he told Storm. "They are completely independent stories."
Only On The Web: To hear more of Storm's exclusive interview with Michael Paradise,