Sante Kimes and her son Kenneth Kimes Jr. were convicted of multiple murders
NEED TO KNOW
Sante's crimes began in the 1960s and escalated after her husband Kenneth Kimes Sr.'s death in 1994
To avoid the death penalty, Kenneth Jr. later confessed to murdering several people with his mom
Sante Kimesled a long life of stealing, conning and killing.
She was born in Oklahoma and had a troubled childhood during which she allegedly took an interest in pyromania and tortured her siblings with fire, as her younger sister, Retha, claimed in a 2001 A&E documentary. Her crime spree began in the 1960s when she moved to Las Vegas and was arrested for theft.
In the early 1970s, Sante met motel tycoon and millionaire Kenneth Keith Kimes Sr., and they married in 1981. The couple had one son, Kenneth Kimes Jr., who was born in March 1975. Sante went on to commit a long list of crimes — including insurance fraud, arson and forgery, among others. In 1985, she was arrested for enslaving maids and served five years in prison, perThe New York Times.
After Kenneth Sr. died in 1994, Sante's actions escalated, and people in her orbit started disappearing. In 1998, she was arrested — alongside her son Kenneth Jr. — for the murder of 82-year-old New York socialite Irene Silverman. During their investigation, police also connected her to the deaths of Syed Bilal Ahmed, David Kazdin and Elmer Holmgren.
Sante's crimes and how she got her son involved in them are featured in an episode of the second season ofHomicide: New York, titled "Mother Knows Best," which hit Netflix on March 25.
Here's everything to know about what happened to Sante Kimes and Kenneth Kimes Jr.
Who was Sante Kimes?
Sante was born Sandra Louise Walker in Oklahoma on July 24, 1934, according to theLos Angeles Times. She moved to Las Vegas and quickly began racking up an arrest record. In the 1960s, she was arrested for petty theft, auto theft and larceny, among others.
She was married at least three times, per the publication, with the first being unknown and the second to her high school boyfriend, Edward Walker. She and Walker had a son, Kent, who later wrote the bookSon of a Grifter,that detailed how his mom allegedly used him as an accomplice in her thievery. He was never charged in connection with any of her crimes.
In the early 1970s, she met real estate mogul and millionaire Kenneth Sr., who was her "biggest score ever," Kent later claimed to theLos Angeles Timesin 2003. They welcomed a son together, Kenneth Jr., in 1975, and got married in 1981.
Sante continued committing crimes and pulling scams. Over the years, she was accused of stealing a car, making a six-figure false claim to an insurance company and using nearly two dozen aliases.
"To her it was like a game of Monopoly," one of her former neighbors toldThe New York Times. "She just liked to do it."
In 1985, she and Kenneth Sr. were arrested on slavery charges. Several of their former house workers reported that they had been imprisoned in the home, and Sante was subsequently sentenced to five years, while Kenneth Sr. served three years.
The family reunited after they were released and lived together until Kenneth Sr. died in 1994. From then on, her crimes escalated.
By the late 1990s, Sante and Kenneth Jr. were wanted in several states on suspicion of arson and insurance fraud. They were also suspected of killing a Los Angeles businessman and a banker.
Who was Irene Silverman?
Silverman was an 82-year-old socialite living on the Upper East Side in the 1990s. She was a former Radio City Music Hall ballerina who was married to a wealthy banker until his death.
She was living alone in her townhouse when she decided to convert some of the rooms into rental units. In the summer of 1998, she rented one of her apartments to a 23-year-old man who went by Manny Guerrin. Manny often brought an older woman, who said her name was Eva, to the townhouse. Silverman grew suspicious of Manny after she caught him trespassing on her floor and reportedly had plans to evict him.
Unfortunately for Silverman, she was unaware that Eva and Manny were actually Sante and Kenneth Jr. and had targeted her for their next con.
On July 5, 1998, Silverman told her housekeeper that she was taking a nap, but she vanished from her apartment later that night. Her ID, keys and thousands of dollars of cash were also missing.
What did Sante and Kenneth Jr. do to Silverman?
When Silverman disappeared on July 5, 1998, police were already investigating Sante and Kenneth Jr. on theft, arson and murder charges in Nevada, California and the Bahamas. When they learned the real identities of Silverman's two tenants, they instantly became suspicious.
Advertisement
Sante and Kenneth Jr. were not in the townhouse, but police later found them elsewhere in N.Y.C. and arrested them on an unrelated charge. They searched their car and found several pieces of evidence — including guns, Silverman's belongings, wigs and a notebook detailing their plans.
Investigators believe that they had targeted Silverman long before they moved in and had planned on killing her to con their way into receiving her home and fortune. Police searched Kenneth Jr.'s apartment and found further incriminating evidence, like duct tape and rope.
Sante and Kenneth Jr. were arrested in connection with Silverman's death shortly after. Authorities never recovered Silverman's body and Sante has vehemently maintained her innocence.
"There is no crime. There is no body," she said in a2000 interview with Larry David on CNN. "I used to believe in this country. I don't believe in this country anymore."
What other crimes were Sante and Kenneth Jr. convicted of?
At the same time that Sante and Kenneth Jr. were facing charges for Silverman's death, they were also wanted on murder charges in California and the Bahamas.
In September 1996, 46-year-old banker Syed Bilal Ahmed — who managed Sante's offshore bank accounts — vanished after meeting Kenneth Jr. and Sante in the Bahamas. Kenneth Jr. later confessed to killing Ahmed alongside his mom. She maintains that he only confessed to avoid the death penalty and no charges were made in connection with Ahmed's disappearance.
Two years later, Sante and Kenneth Jr. allegedly killed 63-year-old L.A. businessman David Kazdin. Police claimed that Kazdin let Sante use his name on a deed of a Las Vegas home, but she later forged his signature on a six-figure loan. When he learned about the forgery, she allegedly sent Kenneth Jr. to kill him. Kazdin's body was found in a dumpster near the Los Angeles International Airport in March 1998.
In addition to Ahmed and Kazdin, the mother and son were also accused of killing 50-year-old lawyer Elmer Holmgren in 1991. Holmgren allegedly helped Sante commit arson to obtain an insurance payout, but when police started to investigate the fire, Holmgren vanished while on a trip with Sante and Kenneth Sr. Kenneth Jr. later claimed that Sante told him she had killed Holmgren with a hammer. No charges were made in connection with Holmgren's disappearance.
What happened to Sante Kimes?
Sante and Kenneth Jr.'s first trial took place in 2000 on the charges related to Silverman. In May of that year, they were convicted of killing Silverman and both were sentenced to around 120 years in prison.
The following year, Sante and Kenneth Jr. were extradited to L.A. to stand trial for Kazdin's murder. Their trial began in 2004, but Kenneth Jr. changed his plea to guilty in exchange for a deal that would eliminate the possibility of the death penalty for himself and his mother.
Kenneth Jr. testified against Sante and confessed to killing Kazdin, Silverman and Ahmed. He also claimed that Sante killed Holmgren. However, Sante vehemently denied any involvement in the murders and accused the police of mishandling her case.
Sante was again sentenced to life in prison without parole for Kazdin's death and was called "one of the most evil individuals," by Superior Court Judge Kathleen Kennedy-Powell at her 2005 sentencing, perNBC.
After her California conviction, Sante was returned to a New York state prison to serve her first sentence. She died from natural causes at the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women on May 19, 2014, perNew York Daily News. She was 79 years old.
Where is Kenneth Kimes Jr. now?
Kenneth Jr. last saw his mother at the 2004 trial where he confessed to the crimes. He is serving his life in prison sentence at the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility in San Diego, Calif. In January 2025, he spoke about his crime-ridden past on an episode ofDatelinetitled, "The Devil Wore White."
"I absolutely regret my past and the ignorance of my past crimes makes we want to do better and engage in what I would call tangible contrition," he said, while adding that he'd tell the victim's families, "I am sorry. I was an idiot and my ignorance I am ashamed of."
Kenneth Jr. also addressed his past crimes and clarified why he confessed to the murders in an episode ofHow It Really Happenedon CNNin 2024.
"I want to make it clear that I did not confess because I wanted to rat my mom out. I confessed because I was afraid of the death penalty for me or her," he said. "When I started confessing, she started crying."
However, even a decade after Sante's death, Kenneth Jr. still struggles to understand their complicated relationship.
"I know a lot of people in my situation would say, 'She destroyed my life.' And that's true to an extent. But I love my mom," he said. "She had a lot of baggage, and she was a complicated person with criminal tendencies. But I would never hate my mom."
Read the original article onPeople