Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told a judge that his wife drunkenly battered him, ran over his dog and repeatedly threatened to kill herself if he left her, according to a newly revealed 2011 affidavit in which he sought an order of protection from her.
RFK Jr. said she abused his kids by his first wife, she threatened to tell cops he beat her so as to “destroy” him, and he confessed that he cheated on her to escape - making the situation worse.
Mary Richardson Kennedy hanged herself May 16 after googling how to make a noose. She was distraught at the looming likelihood that she would lose custody of their four kids.
The 60-page sealed affidavit filed by RFK Jr. last Sept. 16 in Westchester Supreme Court asked for an order of protection “for the sake of my own safety and sanity.”
It was obtained by Newsweek, which posted excerpts online to accompany a story by Lawrence Leamer, a longtime Kennedy chronicler who interviewed the couple’s friends and Colombian housekeeper, producing a tragic portrait of marital woe beneath the facade of Kennedy glamor.
The affidavit is the inverse of the story told by Mary’s siblings - that RFK Jr. drove her to drink and suicide by his constant philandering.
Instead, he suggests her irrational and often violent behavior drove him to cheat.
The housekeeper, who was not named, recounted how Mary once threw a plate of spaghetti at RFK Jr. in front of the children, and went after him with scissors while he was taking a bath.
RFK Jr. said in the affidavit that Mary would sometimes start beating him in the middle of the night and he once jumped out a second-story window to save himself.
By the time Mary killed herself in their Westchester home, she was only allowed to see her kids during visits supervised by the housekeeper.
Cripplingly depressed, she was drinking a lot, said the housekeeper, who said she once found Mary passed out at the kitchen table, her face in a plate of congealed food.
RFK Jr., a prominent environmentalist who battled his own addiction demons, wrote lyrically in his affidavit of how he first fell for the tall, beautiful architect who was best friends with his sister, Kerry.
“Mary was a kind, generous person, open and considerate to and curious about all people from royalty to cab drivers. She was stunningly beautiful, with pitch-perfect taste, electric charm and a genius for friendship,” he wrote.
“I loved the way she blossomed in crowds, the thirst for adventure that brought her alive during our frequent white water and wilderness camping trips.”
But even before they were married, when Mary was pregnant with their first son, he said she flew into a rage about his estranged first wife and punched him in the face.
“She was a trained boxer and I got a shiner. Her engagement ring crushed my tear duct causing permanent damage,” he wrote.
In the filing, RFK Jr. asked court to stop Mary from physically attacking him, verbally abusing him, making unwanted visits to his house, following him on trips and stealing his possessions, including his phone, his passport and his medications.
He also asked that she be required to remain sober in front of their children - Conor, 17, Kyra, 16, Fin, 14, and Aidan, 10 - and stop threatening suicide in front of them.
In the affidavit, RFK Jr. said Mary suffered from borderline personality disorder. The leading expert on the disorder, Harvard psychiatrist John Gunderson, told Newsweek he had agreed after meeting her.
“I loved Mary. I want that to be known. I adored her. I didn’t adore what BPD did to her,” family friend John Hoving told Newsweek.
Members of Mary’s family did not return calls.
They blame RFK Jr. for the divorce and suicide and went to court to get custody of Mary’s body to stop him from burying her near the Kennedy family's compound on Cape Cod.
The Newsweek story revealed that the oldest children, Conor and Kyra, told the judge they wanted their mother buried on the Cape so it would be easier to visit her grave. The Richardsons lost their bid to bury Mary in the family plot in Vermont.
RFK Jr.’s affidavit says he first began thinking about divorce three years after their 1994 marriage.
He described his 9-year-old daughter from his first marriage, Kick, coming to him to say tearfully, “Daddy, I think Mary is stealing from me.”
He said he told her, “Honey, don’t say that, Mary loves you.”
“No, Daddy, Mary hates me,” she replied.
RFK Jr., continued: “A few weeks later, looking for something in Mary’s bureau, I found a collection of Kick’s lost items concealed beneath a layer of Mary’s clothing.
“I began to see additional evidence of Mary’s subtle but relentless campaign to make my children feel unwelcome in my home.”
He asked for a divorce, but she threatened suicide each time he brought it up, RFK Jr. wrote in the affidavit.
In 2003, he began cheating, starting with a three-year affair that he said he broke off after Mary made a half-hearted suicide attempt.
A series of shorter flings followed. Mary learned some of the details and became increasingly upset, telling friends about his infidelity.
In the affidavit, RFK Jr. described in harrowing terms what happened on May 26, 2011, after he had moved out.
He said Mary ran over and killed the family dog, Porcia, in the driveway and told him to come spend the night to comfort the distraught children.
“She said she intended to kill herself unless I called off the divorce and unless I promised to recommit to the marriage,” he wrote.
He says he went to the house to find Mary drunk in her room.
“I opened the door and she leapt out of her bed and hit me with a roundhouse punch that, had I not blocked it, would have undoubtedly broken my face,” he wrote.
“(She) hit me again, raining blows down on me as I backed down the hall. She struck me maybe 30 more times or more.”
He said she screamed to their crying youngest son, Aidan, “He is a demon. He is the most evil kind of man in the world. Everything he does is evil and a fraud. He is a philanderer, an adulterer, a sex addict.”
“I backed down the back stairs blocking her blows — and dodged out the kitchen door. She pursued me, pummeling and pushing me with her fists all the way,” he wrote.
In a stinging blow to the Richardsons, Newsweek reprinted an email RFK Jr. wrote to Mary’s siblings about a month later predicting tragedy.
“Mary is a wonderful, generous, kind, and wise person but depression and illness are now killing her,” he wrote. “I know you have told me that her frequent suicide threats are not real. I do not believe this is accurate. I see her now sinking into a terrible darkness. She desperately needs a family intervention.”
By then, family bitterness was so deep that her brother, Thomas Richardson, told him to stop sending such emails and threatening to embarrass him publicly if he persisted, Newsweek reported.
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