NY: The body of Robert Kennedy Jr's wife was the subject of a bitter legal battle yesterday as her family tried to prevent the Kennedys from burying her at a family plot in a service set to take place today.
After a judge ruled in favour of her husband, Mary Kennedy's body was released just hours before her wake at the family home in Bedford, New York where she was discovered hanged on Wednesday following her tragic suicide, the Daily Mail reported.
Her brothers and sisters have said they will attend the funeral at a Catholic church in Mount Kisco, but will also hold their own memorial service in a Manhattan hotel on Monday night.
They are reportedly unhappy with Mr Kennedy's decision to bury his estranged wife near the Kennedy compound in Hyannisport, Massachusetts, so sued to stop her body being turned over to the funeral home which he had commissioned to handle the ceremony.
Mr Kennedy declined to speak about the matter after emerging from a closed court session in White Plains on Friday afternoon, saying only, 'It's all done.'
Later in the evening relatives and friends, including Curb Your Enthusiasm creator Larry David and CBS This Morning host Gayle King, converged on the brick mansion in suburban Bedford.
Floral deliveries and vans full of people arrived as two police cars were stationed at end of the long driveway, keeping reporters at a distance.
'Everyone loved her. She was part of our family,' brother-in-law Douglas Kennedy said as he left the gathering.'She was the most organised, fun-loving person... She loved for everyone to be together, which is what we're trying to do.'
As for the apparent rift between the families, he said only that his late sister-in-law wouldn't have wanted to see her relatives fight and added, 'We're all just trying to stay together.'
After the legal proceedings concluded in the afternoon, the medical examiner's office in Westchester County received an order instructing them to release the body to a funeral home in Bedford.
One of Mary's brothers, Thomas Richardson, filed a legal motion in White Plains on Thursday listing Robert Kennedy as the defendant.
The document was not made public and was then subsequently sealed, along with all other papers related to the case, by Judge Joan Lefkowitz.
Earlier Mr Kennedy spoke for the first time about his estranged wife's long and difficult battle with depression, saying he 'does not know how she made it through the day'.
Friends and other documents revealed she was drowning in credit card debt, feared she would lose both her home and her children and was getting destroyed by her husband in the divorce court.
Speaking from the estate he shared with his wife for 16 years yesterday, Kennedy Jr told the New York Times: 'A lot of times I don’t know how she made it through the day. She was in a lot of agony for a lot of her life.'
Despite this, the 58-year-old continued to file multiple restraining orders against Mary, 52, and tried to get full custody of the children by claiming she was an unfit mother, according to sources - all while he publicly replaced her with his actress girlfriend, Cheryl Hines.
A close friend told the New York Post: 'He was kicking her while she’s down, all alone in this house that she built. In the end, everything was just too much.'
Sister-in-law Kerry Kennedy said Mary - a lifelong friend - had been sober for five months, but was still battling depression.
'She fought with every ounce of her mission to overcome that horrible disease,' she told The New York Times. 'It was not something that she asked for, it was something that she was dealt.
'You know, you sometimes hear things like "I’ve lost my right arm?" I feel like I’ve lost half my body, half my soul.'
The pair had been best friends since they met at college aged 16.
Court records show that as well as battling with debts and depression, she was also fighting a losing battle with her estranged husband as he relentlessly built a case against her in their custody battle.
The son of the late Sen Robert F. Kennedy, he filed temporary restraining orders against Mary that a Westchester judge signed on March 28, April 19 and again last Friday, documents show.
He also filed an order of protection last September and got another judge to hold her in contempt of court later that month, according to the Post.
They were scheduled to meet in court again on August 10 and a four-day trial was planned for September - which could have resulted in her losing custody. It is unclear what the restraining orders were for as records in the case are sealed.
A close friend of Mary said: 'She faced losing her kids, and his relationship with Cheryl Hines was humiliating. 'At an event last month, he walked the red carpet with Cheryl as a couple and took the kids.
'She loved him. Her family and her home [were] her heart and soul. Even after they separated, she was pretending everything was fine. She’d still call him her husband. It was bizarre and sad.'
Mary was also said to be drowning in debt. American Express filed a civil suit against her in Westchester on April 16 and she did not know how she was going to source the money.
Friends said Bobby Kennedy was trying to cut the amount of child support he was giving her and she had no access to the Kennedy trust fund.
Mary - who was once a successful architect but gave it up to look after her children - was petrified of being evicted from the $4million estate which she meticulously renovated two years ago, making it Eco-friendly.
It was just one month after the house was complete that Kennedy filed for divorce. As preparations are made for her funeral, which will take place tomorrow, the extent of the feud between her siblings and the Kennedy clan has been revealed, as the two sides are planning separate memorials.
Two of Mary’s grieving sisters showed up at the couple’s Bedford home on Wednesday - hours after the housekeeper found her hanging in the barn - but Bobby Kennedy Jr abruptly ordered them to leave, family sources told the New York Daily News.
The family were then forced to make a formal request to the Bedford police to enter their sister’s home. Because the divorce was not yet final, Kennedy was allowed to take charge of his wife's funeral arrangements.
He said yesterday: 'Every member of my family, long before I married her, considered her a Kennedy.
He planned a wake for Friday evening and a funeral Saturday at St Patrick’s Church in Bedford, followed by a burial in a Catholic cemetery on Cape Cod near the Kennedy family’s storied Hyannisport compound. But even this was being contested by the 52-year-old's family and friends.
'Hyannisport?' asked one friend. 'You mean the place from which she had been virtually banned for the past two years?'
Most of the most famous members of the Kennedy clan are buried at Arlington National Cemetery or Holyhood Cemetery near Boston.
Sargent Shriver and Eunice Shriver, Robert Kennedy Jr’s uncle and aunt, are the best-known Kennedys buried on Cape Cod from St Francis Xavier Church, the 'Kennedy church' in Hyannis.
Mary’s sisters are organizing a separate memorial to take place on Monday at Andre Balazs’ Standard Hotel in Manhattan.
'For the sake of the children,' said one friend, 'they are going to the "Kennedy" funeral. But they want to remember her in their own way.' As news of her death spread, Mary's torment in her final days were laid bare.
'Mary was terrified that Robert was going to take the kids from her,' a source told RadarOnline. 'She was convinced he was building a case against her as an unfit mother and that he would be pursuing full custody.'
Appearing in public for the first time since his wife's tragic suicide, a visibly haggard Robert Kennedy Jr was seen outside the sprawling New York mansion that the two once shared, as information of Mary Kennedy's lonely final hours emerged.
Mrs Kennedy and Robert Jr, the third-eldest of Robert Kennedy's 11 children, were married for 16 years before he filed for divorce in May 2010.
They had four children - Conor, Finny, Kyra, and Aidan - together, none of whom were home at the time of her death.
They range in age from 11 to 17 years old and spent the majority of time with their mother in New York while Robert Kennedy Jr had relocated to Los Angeles. Her eldest children were away at boarding school and the youngest were with their father.
Mrs Kennedy's suicide was the latest in a succession of tragedies to strike the glittering and powerful Kennedy clan, known as the 'curse of Camelot'.
Her official cause of death was asphyxiation due to hanging, according to an autopsy report. Westchester County Medical Examiner's Office spokeswoman Donna Greene said that results of toxicology tests would not be ready for several months.
Mrs Kennedy had an ongoing battle with drugs and alcohol and on several occasions tried to seek help. She fell deep into despair, threatening suicide so often that the family staged an intervention, another friend said.
She even tried AA meetings, but often relapsed, friends and family said. 'There were times when she had to be taken to the hospital when she would be acting irrationally and threatening to hurt herself,' a source told the Post.
On Wednesday, police surrounded the family home - a red-brick mansion with a columned porch entrance set in acres of woodland. On the grounds are several outer houses.
A distraught Robert Kennedy Jr, 58, entered the home at about 8pm. Mrs Kennedy's family released a statement amid reports of her passing.
'We deeply regret the death of our beloved sister Mary, whose radiant and creative spirit will be sorely missed by those who loved her. Our heart goes out to her children who she loved without reservation.'
In a statement issued by Robert Kennedy Jr's chief of staff, the family described Mary Kennedy as 'a genius at friendship'. It added: 'Mary inspired our family with her kindness, her love, her gentle soul and generous spirit.'
The environmentally-conscious couple completed a massive renovation of their property in April 2010, inviting reporters to check out the new - and 'green' - improvements of the 1920s-era home.
But just a month later, Mary Kennedy's life fell apart in a tumultuous fall from grace.
Her shocking suicide yesterday came two years after her husband's divorce filing on May 12, 2010, and an arrest for drunken driving three days later.
Her only passenger was a dog, and cops said she had a blood-alcohol level of 0.11 per cent; the legal limit is 0.08 percent. Her license was suspended.
As news of her death spread, close friends spoke of her inner torment following her very public divorce from her husband.
Within that same week, police were called to the Kennedy home twice - two days before Robert Kennedy Jr filed for divorce and again on the day after, the Journal News reported.
The first time, Mrs Kennedy was found to be 'visibly intoxicated' by responding officers. When police were called back to the house on May 13, her estranged husband alleged that she was drunk, the paper reported.
No charges were filed in those incidents.Their marriage hit its breaking point amid rumours of his dalliances with other women.
Mary Kennedy was also charged later that year with driving under the influence of drugs, but that charge was dismissed in July 2011 when a judge said the evidence showed she didn't know the medications she had taken would impair her ability to drive.
As news of her death spread, friends spoke of her inner torment following her very public divorce from her husband.
A close family friend told the New York Post: 'She was deeply troubled, abusing alcohol and prescription meds. She had cause.
'She was used up and tossed away by Bobby. That was awful. 'He was going for full custody of the kids, which broke her heart. 'She also had been part of the Kennedy family for 30 years. And now she was being cast aside by them.'
In February 2010, Mrs Kennedy had gone into rehab, friends told the New York Daily News.
One neighbor said: 'She always seems lost these days, whenever she came into the village. Lost and alone and sort of out of it.' There were indications her troubles started even earlier.
In 2007, Robert F. Kennedy Jr drove his wife to a hospital for treatment, but she resisted and ran from the car, according to the Journal News, which cited Mount Kisco police records.
'I remember she was acting kind of out of it, kind of crazy,' a witness, Rae Kesten, told The Journal News in 2007. 'She was running into the street and flailing her arms around.
He was trying to restrain her. I didn't know if they were fighting or not, but I was concerned.'
Mrs Kennedy was also reportedly under increased financial pressure, being chased by creditors and was worried that she may lose her home.
A source told RadarOnline: 'Mary said she was facing financial ruin... she was concerned that Robert was about to substantially reduce the amount of financial support he gave her and she was terrified she would have to file for bankruptcy and lose her home.'
Mrs Kennedy was a crusader for environmental issues and food allergy research, and was known among friends and family as a devoted mother.
With one of her children battling severe allergies, Kennedy co-founded the Food Allergy Initiative, billed as the world's largest private source of funding for food allergy research, and appeared with her family at its annual ball at Manhattan's Waldorf Astoria.
At the time of her sentencing, family and friends spoke out in support of her.
Her mother-in-law, Ethel Kennedy, wrote in a letter that she 'is a caring, nourishing mother who has nursed her four children through lifelong bouts of debilitating allergies,' according to a Journal News account.
Robert Kennedy Jr is currently dating actress Cheryl Hines, best known for her role as Larry David's wife on Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Despite Mr Kennedy's divorce filing in May 2010, the separated couple were still married.
Citing court records, TMZ reported that the divorce case was heading to trial later this year. Mary Kennedy, neé Richardson, was Robert's second wife and the couple married in April 1994.
She had known the Kennedys for years, through her friendship with Robert Kennedy Jr.'s sister, Kerry Kennedy, whom she met at boarding school. She had been Kerry Kennedy's maid of honor at her wedding in 1990.
After a Roman Catholic mass, her own wedding reception was held on a boat on the Hudson River.
Mr Kennedy divorced his first wife in the Dominican Republic a month before his second marriage. Mary gave birth to their first child three months later.
