A Death in Jupiter

Portfolio.com has obtained a heavily redacted digital recording of the 911 call made by Seth Tobias' wife when the hedge fund manager died, on September 4, 2007.

Tobias, 44, founded and ran Circle T Partners, an asset-management firm. His wife, Filomena, found Tobias floating in the pool at their new house in the Bear's Club, a community of luxury homes in Jupiter, Florida, that surround a golf course designed by legendary golfer Jack Nicklaus, who is known as the Golden Bear. She called 911 to summon help.

Her husband, however, was dead when paramedics arrived. The police later searched the house and found empty pill canisters and what appeared to be cocaine. Toxicology results are pending, and Tobias' brothers are locked in a battle with Filomina over his fortune.

Under Florida law, she stands to inherit Tobias' entire estate unless his brothers can successfully invoke the state's so-called "slayer statute." That law stipulates, basically, that one cannot inherit money from a person one has murdered.

Authorities have not classified Tobias's death as a homicide, much less accused or convicted anyone for having killed him.

The brothers' accusations are based on representations made by Tobias's self-described former assistant, Billy Ash, who is represented by Hollywood lawyer-cum-commentator Debra Opri. Ash has told reporters that he has recordings of Filomena essentially admitting to the crime.

In the recordings, he says, she talks of spiking Tobias' pasta with crushed Ambien sleeping pills and then luring him into the pool with the promise of a gay rendezvous with a tattooed stripper known as Tiger.

Ash's own credibility has been called into question due to a lengthy criminal record, but his lawyer has been making the rounds of the talk-show circuit in recent days, saying her client has passed a polygraph test.

Jupiter police acknowledge that they did indeed take some recordings from Ash, but add that if they had enough to arrest her for murder, they would have done so.

The 911 call can be heard here.

by Duff McDonald

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