Sunny von Bülow

The heiress who spent 27 years in a coma

Sunny von Bülow

1932-2008

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By the time Martha “Sunny” von Bülow died last week in a Manhattan nursing home at 76, she had been in a coma for 27 years, 11 months, and 15 days—the result, prosecutors argued, of a murder attempt by her second husband, Claus von Bülow. Languishing in a persistent vegetative state, Sunny inspired two sensational 1980s trials, during which von Bülow was first convicted and then acquitted of the charge.

Known as “Sunny” because of her cheerful disposition, she was the only daughter of a Pittsburgh utilities magnate who left her a fortune that grew to $75 million, said The Providence Journal. The “gorgeous but painfully shy” heiress married the penniless Austrian tennis pro Prince Alfred von Auersperg in 1957. After their divorce in 1965, she married von Bülow, a Danish socialite and aide to J. Paul Getty. Outwardly, they had the trappings of the good life: a 14-room Fifth Avenue apartment in Manhattan and a 23-room mansion in Newport, R.I. But on Dec. 21, 1980, Sunny was found unconscious on her Newport bathroom floor. Her husband, authorities said, had tried to kill her “by injecting her with insulin so he could inherit her fortune and marry a soap opera actress.”

Claus von Bülow was found guilty in 1982 and sentenced to 30 years in prison, said The Washington Post. But “Harvard University lawyer Alan Dershowitz took up his defense on appeal and painted Sunny as an alcoholic and drug abuser who was subject to attacks of hypoglycemia.” Such star witnesses as Truman Capote and Johnny Carson’s ex-wife, Joanne, provided supporting testimony. “In the end, von Bülow’s conviction was overturned on technical grounds that evidence had been mishandled by the police.” Dershowitz’s account of the case, Reversal of Fortune, became a 1990 film that was popular with audiences but not with Sunny’s children, who objected to Glenn Close’s depiction of her “as a nagging wife” who was “pathetic and self-destructive.”

Though Sunny never showed any signs of recovery, her children always kept family photos and fresh flowers by her bedside. As part of a 1987 settlement with them, Claus, now 82, renounced any claim to her money and never spoke publicly about the case.