After 3 Decades, Ex-Surgeon Admits He Threw His Wife's Body Out Of Airplane

Robert Bierenbaum

Photo: New York Daily News

For more than 30 years, Robert Bierenbaum has staunchly denied that he killed his wife, Gail Katz, in 1985. Despite his denials and a lack of physical evidence, Bierenbaum was convicted of murder in 2000 and sentenced to 20 years to life behind bars.

In December 2020, Bierenbaum shocked the parole board when he admitted that he did, in fact, kill his wife. He told the board that he got angry with Katz during a fight and "strangled" her to death in his New York City apartment.

"I wanted her to stop yelling at me, and I attacked her," he said, according to a transcript of the hearing obtained by ABC News.

Bierenbaum, who is an experienced pilot, then said that he dumped her body out of an airplane over the Atlantic ocean.

"I went flying. I opened the door and then took her body out of the airplane over the ocean," he told the parole board.

That theory was one that prosecutors suggested during his murder trial.

"I was like, 'Holy s---, are you kidding me?'" Dan Bibb, one of the prosecutors who brought Bierenbaum to justice, told ABC News. "I was stunned because I always thought that that day would never come, that he would own up, take responsibility for having killed his wife."

Bierenbaum remains in prison and will have another parole hearing in November.

On Friday (October 22), 20/20 will examine the details of Bierenbaum's case.


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