Court TV reporter held hostage at maximum security prison

Wednesday, Oct. 11, 2000 | 11:09 a.m.

Inmate Kenneth Kimes, 25, formerly of Las Vegas, was holding a pen to the throat of Maria Zone, the state Department of Correctional Services said.

Kimes is serving a sentence of 125 1-3 years at Clinton Correctional Facility in northeastern New York. Kimes and his mother, Sante, were each sentenced on June 27 to more than 120 years in prison for murdering Irene Silverman in a scheme to steal her $7 million Manhattan home.

Although Silverman's body was never found, the Kimeses, former Hawaii residents, were convicted after a 13-week trial. Their lawyers said they were planning appeals.

Zone was taken hostage at 2:20 p.m. and Kimes told her camera and sound operators, Drew Harty and Jeremy Drowne, as well as security personnel to "back off," Department of Correctional Services spokesman James Flateau said.

As of 4 p.m., prison negotiators were in the room with Zone and Kimes, who continued to threaten the reporter. The reporter did not appear to be injured, Flateau said.

The Clinton Correctional Facility, 13 miles west of Plattsburgh near the Canadian border, currently houses 2,865 inmates.

Zone has been a free-lance producer-reporter for Court TV about three years, network spokeswoman Betsy Vorst said.

"She's an excellent producer and reporter, a valuable free-lancer," she added.

She interviewed Kimes several weeks ago, conducted the talk without any problems, and returned Tuesday to interview him on camera for "Crime Stories," a documentary-style program.

In the past, Zone reported on Thomas Capano, convicted of murder in Delaware.

Matthew Weissmann, one of Kenneth's lawyers during trial, said Tuesday that he and Kenneth Kimes had recently exchanged letters and calls and Kimes seemed more content than he had been at Rikers Island.

"I am totally shocked by this," Weissmann said about the hostage situation. "In the two and a half years that I've known Kenny, he's never shown that he would do anything like this, despite the charges he was convicted on. He's never shown any violence. He must've totally snapped or something."