The visiting room at Twin Towers Correctional Facility is designed for contact, however for Nick Reiner, it’d as effectively not exist. Rob Reiner’s alleged killer son has been there for weeks in a psychological‑well being unit in downtown Los Angeles, accused of stabbing to dying the mother and father who as soon as turned his struggles into a movie about redemption.
No one from the household has walked by the door.
Instead, relations of the late filmmaker and his spouse, photographer‑producer Michele Singer Reiner, are stated to be maintaining their distance, torn between grief and disbelief as they attempt to course of the accusation hanging over the 32‑yr‑previous.
‘He killed their mother and father. That modifications every little thing,’ one insider advised columnist Rob Shuter’s publication.
Rob Reiner’s Alleged Killer Son And A Family In Shock
Nick was arrested in mid‑December after Rob, 78, and Michele, 70, had been discovered with a number of sharp‑power accidents at their Brentwood house, an prosperous enclave on LA’s west facet higher recognized for movie star actual property than police tape.
Prosecutors have charged him with two counts of first‑diploma homicide with a particular‑circumstance allegation of a number of murders, costs that carry a most sentence of life with out parole or the dying penalty.
For readers outdoors the US, that ‘particular circumstance’ label is not only authorized jargon; in California, it indicators that the case sits on the most severe finish of the spectrum, the place jurors might ultimately be requested to weigh whether or not a defendant ought to stay or die.
Nick has but to enter a plea, with a contemporary court docket date set for 23 February, after his excessive‑profile lawyer, Alan Jackson, abruptly withdrew from the case final month. Jackson cited ‘circumstances past management’ and later insisted he nonetheless believed his former shopper was not responsible below California legislation.
In the meantime, a public defender has taken over, and the case is transferring in direction of the grinding equipment of a US homicide trial: discovery, pre‑trial motions, psychological evaluations, arguments over what a jury might be allowed to listen to.
Behind these procedural steps, a family is deciding what, if anything, they owe to the man accused of tearing them aside.
Isolation, Boundaries And A Carefully Guarded Past
When Nick first arrived at Twin Towers, one of many largest jail complexes in the world, he was positioned on suicide watch, a routine transfer in excessive‑profile, excessive‑danger instances. He has since been taken off that standing however stays in excessive‑commentary housing, confined alone in a cell, monitored each quarter-hour, escorted by deputies and watched on digital camera at any time when he leaves the unit.
According to legislation‑enforcement sources quoted in US media, he eats alone, sleeps alone, and is presently allowed contact solely with authorized counsel and jail workers.
On paper, he can obtain household guests. In actuality, sources near the Reiners say no relations have come. They describe ‘grief layered on high of horror,’ insisting that the collective silence is much less about vengeance than about survival.
‘They’re mourning their mother and father whereas additionally making an attempt to understand what he is executed. You do not simply stroll right into a visiting room after that,’ one insider stated.
Nick is the eldest of Rob and Michele’s three youngsters, alongside siblings Max and Robbie, who’ve all of the sudden discovered themselves orbiting a case that has turned their household identify into a real‑crime headline.
Their chosen response to date is to say nothing, no public statements past early expressions of shock, no obvious contact with their brother in custody. ‘Silence is not about cruelty,’ a supply near them insisted. ‘It’s about boundaries. It’s about surviving one thing unthinkable.’
That intuition to attract a line extends to Nick’s medical historical past. Long earlier than the killings, he and his father co‑wrote Being Charlie, a 2015 movie loosely primarily based on his battles with habit and psychological sickness. Since his arrest, reviews have circulated that he has been recognized with a ‘mental disability‘ and presumably schizophrenia.
Family members, nevertheless, are stated to be deeply fearful that extra non-public data will spill into the general public area, not solely complicating the court docket case however inflicting contemporary hurt on everybody who beloved Rob, Michele and Nick.
For now, Rob Reiner’s alleged killer son waits in a locked cell in downtown Los Angeles, his future hanging in the stability on proof that has but to be heard and a plea he has not but entered. On the surface, the remaining Reiners grieve the mother and father they misplaced and determine, day after day, to not cross the edge into that visiting room.
