REVEALED: Novelist Paul Auster’s son Daniel died in hospital six days after overdosing on a Brooklyn subway station platform: Addict was on bond for death of baby daughter who ingested fentanyl while he took a nap
- Daniel Auster overdosed on April 20 on the platform of a Brooklyn subway station
- He was taken to the hospital where he was pronounced dead on Tuesday April 26
- Auster was out on bond after being arrested on April 16 for the death of his daughter
- Ruby Auster was ten months old when she died in his apartment in November
- At the time, Daniel told police he’d injected himself with heroin then gone for a nap with the infant
- An autopsy revealed she had enough fentanyl in her system to knock out an adult
- Daniel’s wife Zuzan was out at work at the time; it’s unclear if they separated after Ruby’s death
- It remains unclear who paid Daniel’s bond which was set at $100,000 cash or $250,000 bond
Daniel Auster, 44, was found dead on Tuesday from a suspected drug overdose
Paul Auster’s son Daniel died in the hospital on Tuesday six days after being found unconscious having overdosed on drugs on a Brooklyn subway station platform.
NYPD officials on Thursday confirmed that he was found at 9.48am on the northbound G platform at the Clinton Street subway in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn.
He was taken to the hospital but died on Tuesday.
It brings a sad end to a tragic saga that began when his ten-month-old daughter Ruby died in November.
She had ingested fentanyl while her father took a nap in their Park Slope apartment. He found her blue and unresponsive after waking up.
Daniel told police at the time that he’d just injected heroin when the pair lay down to sleep. His wife, Zuzan Smith, told police she trusted him with their daughter.
Daniel Auster’s daughter, Ruby (pictured above), was found lifeless in his Park Slope home on November 1
Author Paul Auster pictured today outside his Brooklyn home. He has not commented on his son’s death
Auster, 75, is believed to have been estranged from his 44-year-old son when he killed his daughter in November, and at the time of his death
It’s unclear what happened in the following six months but on April 16, Daniel was charged with his daughter’s death.
He was released on bond on April 17 by Brooklyn Judge John Hecht, who demanded a $100,000 cash bail or $250,000 bond. It’s unclear who met those bond requirements.
On April 20 – four days after his arrest – he overdosed in the subway station.
Ruby’s mother, Zuzan Smith, has not commented on his death, nor has the Brooklyn District Attorney whose office let him go free.
A DA office spokesman on Thursday would only confirm that they had been informed of his death on Tuesday and that it brought an end to the case.
It is unclear if he was living with Zuzan when he died, or if the pair were separated.
Daniel Auster, 44, is pictured on April 16 when he was arrested for his daughter’s death. He was somehow let out on bond, and killed himself with an accidental overdose six days later. It remains unclear where he was living when he died
The subway platform where Daniel was found unconscious on April 20, four days after his arrest
Daniel would regularly post photos of his wife Zuzan and daughter, Ruby, before her death last year. It’s unclear if he and Zuzan stayed together after Ruby’s death or if they parted ways. When he died, he was living in a different apartment to where he’d lived with Ruby and Zuzan
‘On Wednesday, April 20,2022 at 0948hrs at Washington Avenue/Clinton Street subway station, police officers observed an unconscious 44-year-old male on the northbound G train platform, administered CPR along with FDNY and the individual was removed by EMS to Brooklyn Hospital in stable condition but was later pronounced deceased on Tuesday, April 26,2022,’ an NYPD spokesman said on Thursday.
The New York Post first reported Daniel’s death.
Daniel’s father, Paul Auster, 75, has won numerous international awards for his books, which include titles such as The New York Trilogy,’ ‘The Book of Illusions,’ and ‘Moon Palace.’ In 2017, he was nominated for the Booker Prize for his novel ‘4, 3, 2, 1’, and his work has been translated into more than forty languages.
In Auster’s 1995 film about the lives of people who frequented a Brooklyn tobacco shop, Smoke – which starred Harvey Keitel and William Hurt – Daniel played the role of a book thief.
His mother is author and translator Lydia Davis, 74.
Auster’s stepmother, Siri Hustevdt, leaves her home in Park Slope on Thursday. No one from the family has commented on his death
Siri Hustvedt, wife of Novelist Paul Auster is seen leaving their Brooklyn home on Thursday
Daniel Auster is pictured in a photo with his father Paul, in a shot from his teenage years
Davis and Paul Auster divorced in 1978; in 1982, he remarried, tying the knot with author Siri Hustvedt, and the couple have one daughter together, musician Sophie Auster, 34.
Daniel’s father, Paul Auster, is among America’s most famous authors
A woman believed to be Siri was seen leaving the couple’s Park Slope home on Thursday.
No one from the family has commented on Ruby’s death, Daniel’s arrest or his death earlier this week.
During his teenage years, Auster started going to clubs in New York City and became heavily involved with drugs, according to The New Yorker.
At the age of 18, in 1996, Auster was present in the apartment when a drug dealer, Andre ‘Angel’ Melendez, was murdered by ‘Club Kid Killer’ Michael Alig, a former nightclub promoter, and his roommate, Robert Riggs.
Auster was given $3,000 of Melendez’s money in exchange for his silence.
He later pleaded guilty to possession of stolen property and was given five years probation.
Auster had a string of arrests including several drug possession charges in 2008 and 2010.
In 2009 he was charged with petit larceny and possession of stolen property.
The troubled son of New York author Paul Auster, Daniel, was charged in relation to his infant daughter’s drug overdose death. On Tuesday he was found dead
‘Club Kid Killer’ Michael Alig, who was a former nightclub promoter, is pictured. In 1996, he murdered a drug dealer, Andre ‘Angel’ Melendez, in an apartment in which Auster was present. Auster was paid $3,000 to keep quiet, and was later given five years probation. Alig was found dead on Christmas Eve 2020 from an accidental heroin overdose, at the age of 54
Auster in April claimed his baby daughter died of a fentanyl overdose after he took heroin then went to take a nap with the child by his side while his wife worked, a court heard.
The vivid account allegedly given to the NYPD by Auster was shared by Assistant District Attorney Tien Tran at his arraignment hearing on manslaughter charges.
The infant’s mother, Zuzan Smith, told police that their daughter, Ruby, was awake and alert when she left her in Auster’s care and went to work.
A criminal complaint obtained by DailyMail.com states that Auster told police that shortly after Smith left their home, he injected heroin and then got into bed for a nap with the child by his side.
When he woke up from his nap, she was ‘blue, lifeless and unresponsive’, the complaint states.
The prosecutor said that the girl had enough drugs in her system to ‘render an adult unconscious.’
It’s still unclear how the girl ingested the drugs, but Auster confessed that he kept heroin in his bathroom.
At the time his lawyer, James Godfrey, told The New York Times that he was recently sober and was in drug treatment.
‘This case is painfully tragic, and Mr Auster remains devastated over the loss of his beloved daughter Ruby,’ the lawyer told the paper.
‘Substance use disorder is an issue that countless families reel from each year, and we caution the public to refrain from making any rush to judgment.’
In many of the photos, Auster can be seen posing with his little girl, or cuddling her
Auster’s Instagram page was full of pictures of his daughter and her mother
The trio dressed up for Halloween in a scene from the Wizard of Oz with Daniel as the Tin Man and his wife as Dorothy
An autopsy conducted by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner a few days later found Ruby died of acute intoxication caused by the combined effects of fentanyl and heroin.
Auster, who worked as a landscaper, posted photos of his child and Smith on his Instagram page before jetting off to Mexico and Columbia in January.
On his travels, he seemed to be backpacking like a college student, and taking in several raves.
Auster and his father appeared to be estranged, but Auster wrote Daniel into his work.
Auster, pictured here being led to court for his arraignment, gave the 10-month-old girl Narcan to revive her after he awoke to find her ‘blue, lifeless and unresponsive’
Auster, 44, refuses to face the cameras after he was charged with manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide and endangering the welfare of a child after his infant daughter ingested his heroin while he napped
In his 2004 novel, Oracle Night, the book is narrated by a writer called Trause whose son is a drug addict who terrorizes his stepmother.
During a 2006 Guardian interview, Paul Auster’s second wife Siri Hustvedt who is also a writer, declined to speak about her stepson.
‘Yes. You know, I’m not going to talk about any of that, no. No,’ she said, her eyes reportedly beginning to water.
‘You know, I am married to a writer, and this – writing – is an odd enterprise.
‘It’s something we both support very strongly.
‘I’ve always been behind Paul, and he’s always been behind me.
‘I have a very strong family.’
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