The Nancy Kissel Case - Part 35

• (The Standard)  Drugs cocktail and baseball bat thicken Kissel plot.  By Albert Wong.  August 1, 2005.
• (Reuters)  Wife of murdered banker says he abused her for yrs.  August 1, 2005.
• (The Standard)  Insight into troubled marriage 'crosses the line' .  By Albert Wong.  August 2, 2005.
• (The Standard)  Kissel portrays life of hell.  By Albert Wong.  August 2, 2005.
• (SCMP; no link)  Kissel tells of physical, sexual abuse.  By Polly Hui.  August 2, 2005.
• (Leading The Charge)  Wife of murdered banker says he abused her for yrs.  August 2, 2005.

From the Chinese-language media:

• (Ming Pao)  
  (in translation)  Robert Kissel who has the image among his good friends and domestic helper as the loving father who did not touch alcohol and had no bad habit had that image completely overturned by his wife of 14 years.  The defendant Nancy Ann Kissel pointed out that when she got married, she knew that Robert Kissel had a cocaine habit.  When Robert was studying for his Masters degree and then working, he used cocaine to reduce the pressure.  He also had the habit of imbibing strong alcohol.  But he set up barriers around her own personal interests and preferred her to stay at home day and night.
   
  The defendant said that she was born in the state of Michican, studied business and finance in college in Minnesota, and then studied art design in New York City after graduation.  In 1987, she met Robert Kissel during vacation.  They moved in together and got married two years later.
   
  According to the defendant's recollection, their first two years of marriage was blissful.  Robert Kissel was working in his father's company, but he always wanted to get into finance.  So he became a full-time student to get a master's degree in finance.  Since Robert was not working, she had to take three jobs to earn money.  After graduation, Robert entered the finance field and became successful at Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch.  This meant that he was often travelling on business or had to bring work home.
   
  On the other hand, after giving birth to their eldest daughter in 1994, Nancy Kissel had to abandon her own career in order to take care of the children.  In 1997, one year after the family moved to Hong Kong, the defendant acted as a photographer for the Hong Kong International School which her daughter attended and then happily volunteered to help the school plan the fund-raising carnival.  But Robert was not happy and complained that she was often away from home.  Yet, when she volunteered for the Jewish synagogue, he was supportive because it enhanced his reputation.
   
• (Ming Pao)  
  
  (in translation)  As the case moved into the thirty-fourth day, 41-year-old Nancy Ann Kissel took the stand in her own defense.  Wearing black clothes, told about how she met her husband at first but when she got to how her husband physically assaulted her, she was moved to shed tears.
   
  The defendant pointed out that when she gave birth to their eldest daughter in 1994, her body weight increased to 150 pounds.  At the time, her husband encouraged her to lose weight and found all sorts of strange techniques to reduce weight.  She said that her breasts began to sag after giving birth, which made her husband not like her.  So their sex lives changed as the husband began to force her to do things that she would rather not do.
   
  When she gave birth to their youngest son in October 1999, the husband became worse.  When he did not go out for work, he came home, drank alcohol and had sex with her, often in the form of oral and anal sex.  If she did not cooperate, he would pull her hair and push her head to obey, causing her physical injuries including fractured ribs and bleeding anus.  She did not tell anyone about these things because she was too ashamed.
   
  The defendant claimed to have been beaten mulitiple times by her husband.  For example, she pointed out when she was five months pregnant in 1999, her husband pointed out that her due date coincided with his business trip but he wanted her to go with him.  So he asked her to have an early delivery through induced labor.  When she refused, he grabbed her shoulders and shook her and asked her why she did not respect what he was doing for the family.  Then he pounded the wall with his fists and acted as if he was going to hit her.  Two months later, he brought the matter up again and hit him during the quarrel.
   
• (The Sun)
  
  In the murder case of Merrill Lynch managing director Robert Peter Kissel, the defendant Nancy Ann Kissel took the witness stand in her own defense.  She revealed that her husband had a cocaine habit and would become violent after taking cocaine.  She told in tears that she was involuntarily forced by her husband many times to perform oral and anal sex.  If she refused, she was violently assaulted including fracturing her ribs one time.
   
  41-year-old Nancy Ann Kissel had been quite calm as she sat through the trial proceedings.  Yesterday as she recounted how she was violently treated by her husband, she broke down in tears many times.  She said that even before she came to Hong Kong, her body shape had changed and her breasts sagged.  So her husband began to look for 'alternate' forms of sexual conduct.  If she declined, her husband would pull her hair and throw her on the bed, causing her bruises all over the body.  One time, she bled from violent anal sex.  But the more she struggled, the more violent her husband got.  If she cooperated, the act would finish sooner.
   
  The defendant said that she has never told any friends about being forced to perform sex by husband.  Apart from these violent sexual acts, her husband was also occasionally physically violent.  When she was five months pregnant, she quarreled with her husband and he punched the wall so hard that the paint fell off.  When she was 7-1/2 months pregnant, her husband realized that he would be on an overseas business trip when she was due to deliver.  He wanted her to have an early delivery through induced labor; when she refused, he punched her.
   
  According to the description of the defendant, she and Robert Kissel met in 1987 and got married in 1989.  Robert was helping to mind his father's business in New Jersey.  After they got married, he decided to enter a master's program in finance in New York City.  During his two years of study, his wife worked as a waitress to earn money.  At that time, Robert acquired a cocaine habit and even transacted with the dealer in their home.  The wife asked him to quite, but he ignored her.  Whenever he took cocaine, he became violent and quarrelsome.
   
  The defendant said that Robert graduated in 1991 and began to work in financial companies with success.  In 1994, Nancy gave birth to their first daughter and gained 40 pounds, causing her body to change shape.  Her husband began to complain and wanted her to get back to the trim shape before.  He told her to diet and said, "You can do it!"  In 1998, Robert Kissel was sent to work in Hong Kong.  Nancy became a volunteer at the school where the two daughters went, but her husband was not happy and preferred that she stayed home more.  But he approved her voluntary work at the Jewish synagogue because that would enhance their social standing.
   
• (Sing Pao)
  
  Yesterday, defendant Nancy Kissel testified that she got acquainted with Robert Kissel while traveling on vacation and the two got married in 1989.  After they got married, her husband went to study in a master's program and was not working.  So she had to become a restaurant manager to earn money.
   
  Nancy Kissel currently weight 106 pounds.  After giving birth to their eldest daughter in 1994, she gained 40 pounds to 150 pounds and it took her one year to lose the weight.  For the first time, she realized that she was no longer physically attractive to her husband and that made her feel bad.  Her husband encouraged her to lose the weight and regain her state before marriage.
   
  In 1997, she gave birth to her second daughter.  After giving birth to the two daughters, their lives underwent a drastic change.  Her husband felt that she paid too much attention to their children and they also argued over problems such as dieting.  She thought that the children was an obstacle between them.
   
  The defendant revealed that she realized that her husband and his borther have cocaine habits.  She has personally witnessed her take cocaine.  One time, a dealer friend of Robert came to their apartment with drugs and Robert paid him.  The transaction took place right over their dining table.  She said that her husband also took painkillers because of back ache.  She had tried to persuade her husband to quit the drugs without success.  When her husband took drugs, he became a completely different person who would quarrel over trivia, and even simple things like not having orange juice in the refrigerator can lead to big fights.
   
  When the defendant explained how the husband used violence, she could not help crying.  She said that when she was pregnant with their son in mid 1998, they found out that she would be due when he was on a business trip in Korea.  Her husband wanted her to have early delivery, but she refused.  When she was 5 months and 7-1/2 months pregnant, her husband assaulted her.  He claimed that he did so much of the family, but still did not get respect.
   
  The defendant said that after the daughter was born, her own body shape changed and her breasts sagged.  This displeased her husband and he began to force her to engage in certain sexual acts that she did not liked.  He forced her to engage in oral and anal sex.  The more she struggled, the longer her humiliation became.  There were bruises on her limbs, she bled after anal intercourse and she even fractured ribs after being forced to turn over.  But she thought that this was shameful and so claimed that there were football injuried when she sought treatment, and she did not disclose to anyone about the cause of her injuries.
   
• (Sing Tao; print edition)
  The murder trial continues yetersday and 41-year-old Nancy Kissel, the mother of two daughters and one son, recalled her sexual relationships with her husband.  She told the court that when she gave birth to her elder daughter in 1994, she gained 40 pounds.  Since her body was out of shape, her sexual relationship with her husband changed.  When their youngest son was born in 1999, the husband became very different.  When he came back from work each day, he would drink liquor and then demand sexual intercourse.  If she refused, he would pull her hair and force her to engage in oral and anal sex.  The duration of her sexual torture depended on whether she "went along."  The more she resisted, the longer the time.
   
  After they got married in 1989, she worked three jobs in order to help her husband study business administration at New York University.  At the time, she was aware that her husband was taking cocaine in order to cope with his studies.  She claimed that she witnesses a drug dealer coming to their apartment to transact with her husband.  Her husband became tense after taking drugs, and would be annoyed by trivia such as not having orange juice in the refrigerator.  When they moved from the United States to Hong Kong, Robert Kissel continued to take cocaine in order to have enough energy to deal with the financial markets in both the United States and Hong Kong.
   
  She testified that since arriving in Hong Kong in 1998, she took part in volunteer activities at the International School where her daughters were enrolled.  She emphasized that "the school was my life" but her husband was not supportive and sneered that this was a waste of time without any benefits.  On the contrary, her husband encouraged her to volunteer at the Jewish synagogue because that would elevate the reputation of their family at the synagogue.
   
  The defendant testified that when they first arrived in Hong Kong, her husband did not care about her finances.  Since 2002, he began to control her expenses, successfully reducing the number of her credit cards from four to two.  If she needed cash, she had to show the shopping list to her husband for approval.  The defense pointed out when Robert Kissel worked at Merrill Lyncy between 2000 and 2003, his bonuses were 3 million US dollars.
   
  She sobbed and said that her husband assaulted her first when she was pregnant in 1999 with their youngest son.  He was unhappy that her due date coincided with a planned business trip to South Korea and wanted her to see a doctor to induce early delivery.  They quarreled and he tried to punch her with his fist.  She ducked in time, and her husband's fist hit the wall and cracked a bone.  Later, her husband struck her in the face over the same matter.
   
  At the end of October 2001, the defendant found out that her son's belly was swollen.  She proposed to take the son to Kwong On Hospital for examination.  The husband was indffierent and told her that she was overly sensitive.  But she and the domestic helper took the son to the hospital, and then took him to the United States for treatment.  The son had been found to carry a lot of potentially toxic waste products in his body.

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