The so-called “Preppie Killer” who served 15 years in prison for strangling a woman in Central Park pleaded not guilty Thursday to drug sales and possession.
Robert Chambers and his girlfriend, Shawn Kovell, are accused of dealing cocaine out of their apartment on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. Both were being held pending a hearing Monday.
Kovell, who also pleaded not guilty, has not had trouble with the law and is the type of defendant who normally would be sent to a drug program, said her attorney, Frank Rothman. If she is treated any differently, he said, it’s because she’s associated with Chambers.
Chambers’ attorney, Valerie Van Leer Greenberg, declined to comment.
Chambers, 41, became tabloid fodder in 1986 after the death of Jennifer Levin, an 18-year-old graduate of the exclusive Baldwin School, during a tryst in Central Park. The slaying was splashed across the headlines as the story of a handsome, privileged, prep school youth gone bad.
In 1988, he pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was sentenced to five to 15 years in prison. He ended up serving the maximum term because of discipline problems behind bars, including dealing drugs.