John du Pont

John Eleuthère du Pont (November 22, 1938 – December 9, 2010) was an American convicted murderer. An heir to the du Pont family fortune, he was a published ornithologist, philatelist, conchologist, and sports enthusiast. Du Pont died in prison while serving a sentence of thirty years for the murder of Dave Schultz. In 1972, du Pont founded and directed the Delaware Museum of Natural History and contributed to Villanova University and other institutions. In the 1980s, he established a wrestling facility at his Foxcatcher Farm estate after becoming interested in the sport and in pentathlon events. Du Pont became a prominent supporter of amateur sports in the United States and a sponsor of USA Wrestling. By the 1990s, friends and acquaintances were concerned about du Pont's erratic and paranoid behavior, but his wealth shielded him. On February 25, 1997, he was convicted of murder in the third degree for the January 26, 1996, shooting of Schultz, an Olympic champion freestyle wrestler living and working on du Pont's estate that was located in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania. He was ruled to have been mentally ill but not insane and was sentenced to prison for thirteen to thirty years. Du Pont died in prison at age 72 on December 9, 2010. To date, he is the only member of the Forbes 400 richest Americans to be convicted of murder. John du Pont was born on November 22, 1938, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the youngest of four children of William du Pont, Jr. and Jean Liseter Austin (1897–1988). He grew up at Liseter Hall, a mansion built in 1922 in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania, by his maternal grandfather on more than 80 hectares (200 acres) of land given to his parents at their wedding by his maternal grandfather. Both his parents' families had emigrated from Europe to the United States at the beginning of the 19th century and became highly successful. During the 1920s and 1930s, du Pont's parents acquired more land and developed Liseter Hall Farm for Thoroughbred breeding, showing, and racing.