John du Pont, American billionaire and murderer, died from natural causes he was , 72

John Eleuthère duPont  was an American billionaire and member of the prominent du Pont family who was convicted of murder in the third degree (of Freestyle wrestler Dave Schultz) died from natural causes he was , 72. He was also known as an amateur ornithologist and conchologist, philatelist, philanthropist, coach, and sports enthusiast.

(November 22, 1938^[1] – December 9, 2010)

 Personal Life

John duPont was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of William duPont, Jr. and Jean Liseter Austin (1897–1988). His parents' nuptials—on January 1, 1919, in Rosemont, Pennsylvania—were billed as the "Wedding of the Century" in media accounts. Jean's father, William Liseter Austin, an executive of the Baldwin Locomotive Works, gave the couple more than 242 acres (0.98 km²) of land as a wedding gift. William duPont Sr. built Liseter Hall, a sumptuous, three-story Georgian mansion^[2], for the couple on the land in 1922
Both of his parents' families immigrated to the United States in the early 19th century. DuPont was the youngest of four children; he had two older sisters, Jean duPont McConnell and Evelyn duPont Donaldson, and an older brother, Henry E. I. duPont.
DuPont graduated from Haverford School in 1957. He attended college in Miami, Florida, where he studied under and was mentored by Oscar T. Owre, Ph.D.^[3] He graduated from the University of Miami in 1965 with a Bachelor of Science degree in zoology. He also held a doctorate in natural science from Villanova University, which he received in 1973.
On September 3, 1983, he married therapist Gale Wenk, but the marriage was annulled 90 days later.
DuPont died on Thursday, December 9, 2010. A spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections said DuPont was found unresponsive in his bed at the Laurel Highland State Correctional Facility. He was pronounced dead at 6:55 a.m. at Somerset Community Hospital. DuPont had unspecified health issues and had been ill.^[4]

David Schultz murder

In 1997, DuPont was convicted of murdering Olympic Gold Medalist wrestler Dave Schultz the year before and sentenced to 13 to 40 years in prison. Experts at the trial testified that DuPont suffered from paranoid schizophrenia.
On January 26, 1996, DuPont shot Schultz dead in the driveway of Schultz's home on DuPont's 800-acre (3.2 km²) estate while Schultz's wife and DuPont's head of security witnessed the crime. The security chief was sitting in the passenger seat of DuPont's car while DuPont shot 3 bullets into Schultz. Police did not establish a motive. Schultz was a longtime friend of DuPont who had repeatedly tried to help him.^[5]
DuPont's friends said the shooting was uncharacteristic behavior for him. Joy Hansen Leutner, a triathlete from Hermosa Beach, California, lived for two years on the estate.^[6] Leutner said DuPont helped her through a stressful period in the mid 1980s. She later said, "with my family and friends, John gave me a new lease on life. He gave more than money; he gave himself emotionally." She expressed incredulity about the killing. She is quoted as saying "There's no way John in his right mind would have killed Dave."^[7]
Newtown Township supervisor John S. Custer Jr. said, “at the time of the murder, John didn’t know what he was doing.”^[8] Charles King, Sr., a DuPont stable hand and manager for 30 years, claimed he knew DuPont well throughout his life. King's son Charles “Chuckie” King Jr. said he considered DuPont his friend during his childhood. Charles King Sr. blames the DuPont security consultant, for influencing what happened. King said “I don’t think John could shoot someone unless he was pushed to or was on drugs”. “After that guy starting hanging around him, my son always said Johnny changed. He was scared of everything. He was always a little off. But I never had problems with him, and my son never had problems.”^[8]
After the shooting, the multimillionaire locked himself in his mansion for two days while he negotiated with police on the telephone. Police turned off his power and were able to capture him when he went outside to fix his heater. During the trial one of the defense's expert psychiatric witness described DuPont as a paranoid schizophrenic who believed Schultz was part of an international conspiracy to kill him. He said DuPont believed people would break into his house and kill him, the reason he put razor wires in his attic.
DuPont pleaded "not guilty by reason of insanity". The insanity defense was thrown out and on February 25, 1997, a jury found him guilty of third degree murder but mentally ill. In Pennsylvania, third degree murder is a lesser charge than first degree (intentional) or second degree (during the perpetration of a felony) and indicates a lack of intent to kill. In Pennsylvania criminal code, "insanity" applies to someone whose "disease or defect" leaves him unable either to understand that his conduct is wrong or to conform it to the law.^[9] The jury verdict of "guilty but mentally ill" meant the sentence would be referred to Judge Patricia Jenkins who then was given the opportunity to sentence him from 5–40 years. The prosecution failed to mention DuPont used hollow point bullets and fired the last shot into Schultz's back while Schultz was bleeding to death from a gunshot wound to his chest and crawling face down in the snow trying to get away. Some Schultz family members were outraged at the verdict. The wrongful death lawsuit petitioned by Dave's widow Nancy following the guilty verdict resulted in Nancy and Dave's two children receiving a multi-million dollar settlement.
DuPont was sentenced to 13 to 30 years incarceration and was housed at the State Correctional Institute-Mercer, a minimum-security institution in the Pennsylvania prison system.^[10]
He was first eligible for parole January 29, 2009; however, it was denied. DuPont's maximum sentence would have ended on January 29, 2026, when DuPont would have been 87.^[11] The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the verdict in 2000. In 2010 the 3rd Circuit U.S. appeals court in Philadelphia rejected all but one issue raised on appeal (involving his use of a Bulgarian prescription drug, scopolamine, before he fatally shot Schultz in 1996), and requested written briefs.^[12] However, DuPont died in prison on December 9, 2010.

Interests

Ornithology

As an ornithologist, DuPont is credited with the discovery of two dozen species of birds. He wrote a number of books on the subject of birds, including: South Pacific Birds, South Sulu Archipelago Birds; an Expedition Report, Birds of Dinagat and Siargao, Philippines; an Expedition Report, and Philippine Birds. He was the second author of Living Volutes: a Monograph of the Recent Volutidae of the World, which he co-wrote with Clifton Stokes Weaver.

Philately

Du Pont was also a philatelist. In a 1980 auction, while bidding anonymously, he paid $935,000 for one of the rarest stamps in the world, the British Guiana 1856 1c black on magenta.^[13]

Athletics

Before his arrest, DuPont was an accomplished athlete and coach in wrestling, swimming, track, and modern pentathlon. He was also involved in promoting a subset of the modern pentathlon (run, swim, shoot) as a separate event.^[14][15] DuPont was a competitive wrestler. His only wrestling experience prior to taking up the sport in his late 50's was as a freshman in high school. He began competing again at the age of 55 in the 1992 Veteran's World Championships in Cali, Colombia; in 1993 in Toronto, Canada; in 1994 in Rome, Italy;^[16] and in 1995 in Sofia, Bulgaria.

Supported institutions

DuPont founded the Delaware Museum of Natural History in 1957 which opened to the public in 1972. He was the institution's director for many years.
He helped fund a new basketball arena at Villanova University which opened in 1986. Originally, the venue was called duPont Pavilion, but his name was removed from the facility after his conviction. Today, the building simply is called The Pavilion.
After his mother's death, DuPont turned his 440-acre (1.8 km²) estate in Newtown Square into a wrestling facility for amateur wrestlers^[17]. DuPont's wrestling team was called "Team Foxcatcher."

Foxcatcher Farm

William Sr. built Liseter Hall for Willie and Jean in 1925 on more than 600 acres (2.4 km²) of land given to the couple as a wedding gift in 1919 by Jean’s father, William Liseter Austin, an executive of Baldwin Loco­motive Works. The DuPonts divorced in 1940, but Jean Austin du Pont maintained Liseter Hall Farm until her death in 1988, at which point Willie and Jean’s son John Eleuthere duPont assumed stewardship and renamed it Foxcatcher Farm after his father's famed Thoroughbred racing stable.^[18]
The operations under Willie and Jean were among the envy of horse racing operations. In the 1920s and ’30s, Liseter Hall was considered the ne plus ultra of Mid-Atlantic horse facilities. In addition to the indoor galloping track, the farm featured a large barn for race horses; a 40-foot (12 m)-wide by 120-foot (37 m)-long indoor riding ring, still used by King for breaking and schooling; the half-mile training track and its adjacent combination viewing stand/water tower; a breeding shed, which continues to host matings for Two Davids and Tricky Mister; a hunter barn; a show horse barn; a loading barn with ramps for transporting horses to competition; and a grassy, half-mile chute that connected the training track with the race horse, hunter and show horse barns.^[18]
Before, during and after the legal issues following John (cited above) significant changes occurred to the DuPont property. First to go: John's mother’s dairy herd, nearly 70 Guernseys, in the fall of 1996. Next, the dairy farm itself, sold by the Delaware Museum of Natural History, which he formerly headed, in January 1998. Since then, the land, where Jean Austin du Pont’s cows grazed contentedly for the better part of the 20th century, changed hands again, and now is slated to become the campus for a relocated prep school, as well as a community of new million-dollar-plus homes.^[18] That left only the 400-plus acres of Foxcatcher Farm.

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