Stabloid Story

Back in 1973, when the recently dead Leona Helmsley was 53 and her real-estate mogul husband Harry, was 64, they made the papers by telling the police that an intruder had broken into their Palm Beach Towers penthouse and stabbed the missus with a carving knife in the arm and chest, collapsing her lung. Mr Helmsley, they said, chased the gas-mask-wearing supposed burglar down a hallway, but he escaped. The police at the time suspected it was Harry who stabbed his wife, a bitch whom the press politely dubbed the Queen of Mean, because nothing added up at the scene. But since Leona refused to testify against her “pussycat” husband, there was nothing the courts could do. (Full story at Rush & Molloy)