A Lantana woman who always suspected her son-in-law was “too perfect” said on Wednesday she is pleased a jury convicted him of killing her daughter by throwing her overboard during the couple’s honeymoon cruise.
Scott Robin Roston, 36, was found guilty of second-degree murder in Los Angeles on Wednesday.
Prosecutors said he killed Karen Waltz Roston, 26, who graduated from Lake Worth High School in 1979, after the two argued while on the cruise ship Star Dancer, which was sailing off the California coast.
In convicting Roston, jurors rejected his claim that Israelis killed his wife in retaliation for a book he wrote about human rights abuses in Israel.
Karen’s mother, Robert Seaquist, also rejected that theory, as well as Roston’s original claim to police that powerful winds blew his wife overboard.
“I didn’t believe that blown overboard stuff for one minute,” Seaquist said from her hotel room in Los Angeles. She scoffed at the possibility of Israeli agents killing her daughter because of Roston’s book, saying, “Oh please. One copy was sold before Scott was arrested.”
Seaquist said she first suspected her son-in-law’s role in her daughter’s death when he failed to contact her after Karen was discovered missing from the cruise ship.
“He never called to say she was missing,” Seaquist said. “When his father told me there was a woman overboard and they were holding Scott, I knew, I knew, I just knew it. I’ve never had a doubt in my mind since then.”
During the monthlong trial, Roston’s attorney, David Kenner, portrayed his client as distraught over the loss of his wife.
Kenner said the prosecution failed to prove Roston was responsible for Karen’s death and continued to suggest that Israeli agents killed her, pointing to two Israeli names on the passenger list.
One of the Israelis on the cruise appeared as a surprise witness for the prosecution during the trial and denied any connection to the killing.
Roston, a Santa Monica chiropractor, made Seaquist and her husband uneasy from the start, Seaquist said. He did not seem believable, she said.
“He was too perfect when we met: very good looking, super personality, very, very nice to us,” she said.
She took a month off from work to attend the trial.
“I was satisfied, happy, with the verdict,” she said. “I can’t bring my daughter back. If his being convicted would bring her back, I’d be ecstatic. Under the circumstances, it couldn’t have been any better.”
Sentencing is scheduled for June 5. Roston faces life imprisonment.
