According to a frequent guest at Duke's various houses, Duke became more and more upset with Burns: "Doris told me that James started to strut around the place as if he was Mr. She had received another $10 million of her inheritance in 1937, and would receive at least as much in 1942. We used to sit in the sunroom with these tiny bits of broken porcelain and she'd say, 'It's got to be fixed, and I can do it better than most people.' Heffner told me that Duke was annoyed with Rossellini for falling behind on the rent on the New Jersey guesthouse. Burns served as Chandi Heffner Duke's "companion, confidant, cook, bodyguard," according to the suit, and she, in turn, agreed that they would divide "her expected inheritance." I fumbled through an introduction. I think somebody is trying to kill me.". I remember that the captain of the helicopter was very worried and wanted her to leave early. Chandi Heffner In 1984, Doris met a woman named Chandi Heffner in Hawaii. "Buck" Duke was obsessed with his only child. He has an alcohol problem, but he's a basically good person. I tried to see her the following week when I was in California, and there were about a dozen times since then that I called when I made trips to California, where I would simply get a response on the other end of the line that was: 'Miss Duke is doing well. She was so alive. And all around him were all these liquor bottlesGrand Marnier and sherry. "He seemed depressed, and Doris thought it would give him more self-esteem. Banks never saw her again. I used to tell her, 'You know, Doris, some people do like you for yourself. And then Chandi said something that took me aback: 'Bobby, I can't understand why you have a friend like that and yet you're struggling to have a dance publication. After she returned to Newport later that month, Banks invited her to a concert, but she forgot the date. After testy negotiations with local authorities, she finally shipped the pieces to New Jersey and installed them in her indoor tennis court. When he died in a car crash in 1965, she took to her bed for two days. . After repeated requests for an interview, I received the following statement through the New York public-relations firm representing him: "My duty to Miss Duke is to maintain her privacy even though she is gone.". In the proceedings, Heffner formally renounced her natural parents, certified that she was not consenting to be adopted out of financial considerations, and legally changed her name from Charlene Gail Heffner to Chandi Duke Heffner. He received nothing. . She was taking so many pills at the end and, knowingly or not, killed herself. Heffner is also claiming her right to inherit two trusts which Buck Duke created in 1917 and 1924, on the ground that she is his lineal descendant and grandchild. "There was such a myth about Doris being a solitary person and not going out, so when she showed up somewhere, it was an event. 'Doris Duke really was the last Chinese empress, the last of a type that doesn't exist anymore. I was constantly arguing with Bernard . But on Nicolas mothers side, things get more interesting. After giving the matter prolonged and serious consideration, I am convinced that I should not have adopted Chandi Heffner. He named both his private Pullman car and his 80-foot yacht after her, and surrounded her with bodyguards. This was the fifth time that Duke had rewritten or revised her will since Heffner's banishment 26 months earlier. Lafferty had been working for Nelson and Claudia Peltz for the previous seven months, and Rybak says, "The Peltzes put him in a 28-day program. "Not at all. Heffner also claims she saved the heiress's life on more than one occasion: once when Duke collapsed at her Newport estate in a "pool of blood," and a second time when Heffner recalls diving into the freezing Atlantic to save Duke from drowning. . Doris loved animals. Demopoulos said that Duke had mentioned her suspicions that she was being poisoned. We used to joke that she'd outlive me. Nanaline worshiped Society, and she disapproved of her tall, awkward, studious daughter. Imelda stayed for a week, I think. Heffner told me she had left "the farm community" and was living with Gordon Damon, a real-estate agent whose house was near Duke's Diamond Head estate. Her telephone was not listed in the Los Angeles area. In Newport, she loved going to the jazz festival, and then one would sometimes have dinner in that huge house with the ferocious dogs snarling behind the gates. I do feel like I'm being drugged. Heffner also said that Duke confided that she thought her mother had wanted to abort her. LOS ANGELES (AP) _ An ex-Marine sued the adopted daughter of late tobacco heiress Doris Duke for $33 million in palimony, claiming he gave up three years of his life to encourage her friendship with Duke. He was born on August 27, 1952, in Peekskill, New York, USA, as Paul Rubenfeld. It was at that juncture, Heffner claims, that Duke made the oral promise that is the basis of her breach-of-contract suit. "He was so attentive," Banks says. With a love for all living things, Ms. Heffner maintains a U.S. ranch that takes in rescued horses, birds, donkeys, pigs, and many other animals. ", "What struck me about Chandi was her hairit came all the way down below her waist," says Phyllis Saretta of her first meeting with Chandi Heffner. and I finally quit just before Labor Day. I really don't know what the hell was going on, frankly. The baby's death profoundly affected Duke, and she even hired psychics to try to. This month, Chandi Heffner's lawyers, Ben Michel of Riker, Danzig and David Keyko of Winthrop, Stimson, will file her objections to Duke's will in New York State Surrogate Court, accusing Bernard Lafferty of "undue influence and sequestering." . It would come back. You're Arden. '" As the organization grew, she set up a program exclusively focused on serving people in rural communities where money, jobs, health care, and education are scarce. We knock, we bang, we yell. "We concentrated on her leg-muscle group," he said. Doris bought her a sprawling horse farm worth then 30 years ago over a million bucks. It was at this time, she said, that Duke told her that she thought her food was being poisoned. "He had done her hair in a pageboy, and she looked so pretty, though she was painfully thin." For some reason, Doris actually came to believe that Chandi. Keep in mind, people are entitled to a change of heart. All. She was not on steroids in the latter half of 1990, and this was not a mood swing. View their profile including current address, phone number 808-882-XXXX, background check reports, and property record on Whitepages, the most trusted online directory. She has completely wired the small house on her own, and she boards horses and cows for neighbors for $15 a head per month. Chandi Duke Heffner, Self: Oh My God. When Duke was 27 years old, she delivered a premature baby daughter who died just 24 hours after being born. Sources at Duke's estates, however, portrayed Heffner in a different light. He said the couple, who lived together from 1990 until 1993, agreed that Burns would be not only be her confidante-companion but ``cook, body guard, security specialist and assist in financing any claims Heffner Duke may find it necessary to bring to enforce her rights against Doris Duke.. . Her estate, said one family member yesterday, is valued at more than $1 billion. One afternoon in February, the architect John Warnecke went to Shangri La for tea. Lafferty also may pay fees to and divide commissions among the trustees as he sees fit. He came over here, and she died. I feel in danger.' A Peltz-family friend told me that, contrary to reports in the press, "there was never any rivalry of any kind at any time between Claudia and Chandi. ", James Cromwell maintained that it was not his child, and friends assumed that it was Cunningham-Reid's. Believing that Heffner was the reincarnation of her daughter, Arden, Duke bought her a million-dollar ranch in Hawaii, and . This should be some rehearsal dinner! Doris was into it, too. As a young girl, she wrote him love notes, which he pored over again and again. I have come to the realization that her primary motive was financial gain. Chandi Heffner is 69 years old today because Chandi's birthday is on 08/26/1953. '", In 1947 she married again, but handed the groom a prenuptial agreement at the altar. . That's not the Doris I knew. ", Donald Robinson, a New Jersey lawyer who had worked closely with Duke since the early 70s, will not comment about the lawsuit, but he speaks glowingly of Heffner's abilities. Then one day in June, Miss Duke called me and said, 'Thomas, have you seen Bernard? Let them kill each other over it.' Duke. Other people told me that Duke suspected Heffner of poisoning or drugging her, and that she credited Lafferty with saving her life. Although polo and horse jumping are her favorite equestrian activities, Chandi Heffner currently spends the majority of her time overseeing CDHIF USA and CDHIFI. The gossip at Mortimer's was that Duke was furious with him for talking to Stephanie Mansfield. I said, 'Sure, have him call me.' Heffner, 40, a former belly dancer and member of the Hare Krishna, was left nothing by Duke and claimed the heiress was not of "sound mind and memory" when she rather feebly signed the new. The two camels were right outside the dining room on a blue tarpaulin. "Chandi loved animals. Nelson Seabra told me, "A very close friend of Doris's said that she committed suicide. "She's an unusually intelligent person: perceptive, articulate, well-read, culturally alive. The gate had obviously been left open. She was ahead of her time. When tobacco heiress Doris Duke died last October, she left a will that shocked even those who had known her best. Later on we would sleep together and Doris would come in most mornings and sit there on the bed with us and talk. On New Year's Day 1964, she ordered him out, and he retaliated by suing her, claiming that they had been secretly married. What did Disney actually lose from its Florida battle with DeSantis? Denise Hale recalls meeting Eduardo Tirella on the set of The Sandpiper, which was directed by her then husband, Vincente Minnelli, and having several dinners at Falcon's Lair. She thought it was very amusing. For the Beckhams, this marriage is like sinking the best goal ever. "I looked upon Bernard as a member of the small Doris Duke family," says Donald Robinson. Immediately prior to going to work for Duke, he was employed by Heffner's sister Claudia and her husband, Nelson Peltz, one of the leading takeover tycoons of the 80s. . Doris seemed very, very happy. Friends of Duke have intimated that the heiress had become fearful of Heffner's behavior, and eventually locked her out of the Hawaiian estate in early 1991. Then someone new entered the small Doris Duke family: James Burns, a 25-year-old former Marine and martial-arts enthusiast with a notably "buff" physique. Until Doris Duke's death, this would be her principal residence. 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