The Kennedy family is grieving again after the estranged wife of Robert Kennedy Jr hanged herself at her home.

Mary Richardson Kennedy, 52, an architect known for her philanthropic and environmental work who also faced drug and alcohol charges in recent years, was found dead on Wednesday afternoon.

The Westchester County medical examiner's office said after an autopsy on Thursday that Kennedy died of asphyxiation due to hanging. A person familiar with the investigation into her death said authorities concluded that her death was a suicide.

Her husband, Robert Kennedy Jr, a prominent environmental lawyer and the son of former Senator Robert F Kennedy, had filed for a divorce in 2010. The two had married in 1994 and had four children together. The divorce case was still pending at the time of her death.

In the months after the couple's separation became public, Mary Kennedy was arrested twice by police officers who suspected her of driving while intoxicated. her licence was suspended once, but a drink-driving charge was dismissed. Last July, a judge dismissed a charge of driving under the influence of prescription drugs, saying she hadn't been aware it could impair her ability to drive.

On Thursday morning, people who knew the family left flowers at the front door.

“I think every family has its tragedies. But this is too much. you have to feel for them,” said Kim O'Connell, who said she had met the couple while working at their health club.

“I just thought she was just a lady. I woke up this morning and I wanted to do something,” she said.

Both the Richardson and Kennedy sides of the family expressed sadness over her death in public statements that noted her “gentle soul and generous spirit”, her work advocating environmentally responsible building designs and her deep love for her children.

The family hasn't commented publicly on why she might have killed herself.

Kennedy's family had been intertwined with the Kennedys even before her storybook wedding in 1994. she met Robert's sister, Kerry Kennedy, at boarding school and was a maid of honour at her wedding to Andrew Cuomo, now governor of new York, in 1990. Mary's eldest sister, book editor Nan Richardson, was also involved in human rights causes with Kerry Kennedy, now divorced from Cuomo.

With one of her children battling severe allergies, Mary Kennedy co-founded the Food Allergy Initiative, billed as the world's largest private source of funding for food allergy research.

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Kennedy wife died of hanging: authorities

By JIM FITZGERALDAssociated Press

BEDFORD, N.Y. (AP) – Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s estranged wife, Mary Richardson Kennedy, who had fought drug and alcohol problems, was found dead at the family property Wednesday.

An autopsy for the 52-year-old was scheduled for Thursday, and no cause of death had been released.

In a statement issued by Robert Kennedy Jr.'s chief of staff, the family said Mary Kennedy, an architect, “inspired our family with her kindness, her love, her gentle soul and generous spirit.”

“Mary was a genius at friendship, a tremendously gifted architect and a pioneer and relentless advocate of green design who enhanced her cutting edge, energy efficient creations with exquisite taste and style,” the family said.

The former Mary Richardson, a longtime connection of the Kennedy clan, married Robert Kennedy Jr., a prominent environmental lawyer and the son of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and nephew of President John F. Kennedy, in 1994. the couple had four children, the youngest born in July 2001. Robert Kennedy Jr. also has two children from a previous marriage.

Mary Kennedy also was a designer and had overseen the renovation of the couple's home into an environmentally advanced showpiece. her family cited her devotion to her children in remembering her.

“We deeply regret the death of our beloved sister Mary, whose radiant and creative spirit will be sorely missed by those who loved her,” the family said in a statement issued by attorney Kerry Lawrence, who had represented her in a drunken-driving case. “Our heart goes out to her children who she loved without reservation.”

Neighbor Leslie Lampert, who owns the Cafe of Love restaurant a short drive from the Kennedy home, said Mary Kennedy was “at all times just a lovely individual.”

“She was community oriented,” Lampert said. “She was always kind in our presence.”

Another neighbor, Kim Fraioli, a trauma therapist who lives a few houses down from the Kennedys, said the family was private.

“We left them alone,” Fraioli. “We didn't have any interaction. I think it's a tragedy. It's very sad for their family and the surviving children. My heart goes out to the family.”

At the home on Wednesday, a red brick mansion with a columned porch entrance set in a heavily wooded acreage, police kept media away.

Mary Richardson had known the Kennedys for years, through her friendship with Robert Kennedy Jr.'s sister, Kerry Kennedy, whom she met at boarding school. she had been Kerry Kennedy's maid of honor at her wedding in 1990.

She had had trouble with drugs and alcohol and had two high-profile arrests around the time her husband filed for divorce in 2010.

Kennedy was first arrested may 15 of that year on a charge of driving while intoxicated after a police officer reported seeing her drive her car over a curb near the family's Bedford home. her only passenger was a dog, and police said she had a blood-alcohol level of 0.11 percent; the legal limit is 0.08 percent. her license was suspended.

At the time of her sentencing, famous family and friends spoke out in support of her.

Her mother-in-law, Ethel Kennedy, wrote in a letter that she “is a caring, nourishing mother who has nursed her four children through lifelong bouts of debilitating allergies,” according to an account in Westchester's the Journal News at the time.

Kerry Kennedy, in her letter, said, “When I look at my three daughters, my wish for them is that they are as blessed as I have been to have a companion, a confidante, a friend, like Mary Richardson.”

Mary Kennedy was charged later that year with driving under the influence of drugs, but that charge was dismissed in July 2011 when a judge said the evidence showed she didn't know the medications she had taken would impair her ability to drive.

There were indications her troubles started earlier. In 2007, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. drove his wife to a hospital for treatment, but she resisted and ran from the car, according to the Journal News, which cited Mount Kisco police records.

“I remember she was acting kind of out of it, kind of crazy,” a witness, Rae Kesten, told the Journal News in 2007. “She was running into the street and flailing her arms around. he was trying to restrain her. I didn't know if they were fighting or not, but I was concerned.”

The unexpected death of another person connected to the storied Kennedy clan brought to mind the other sorrows the famous family has suffered, including the assassinations of RFK and JFK in the 1960s.

Shopping in Bedford, Diane Glokler said, “I've always just thought that family is very tragic. They keep having tragic things happening to them. It's heart-wrenching.”

Associated Press writer Verena Dobnik contributed to this report.

Copyright 2012 the associated Press. all rights reserved. this material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

KTRE.com

Let me paint a picture for you: Facebook prices its IPO above the expected range Thursday afternoon, say at around $40. the first trade takes place at an eye-opening $70, then the stock peaks out at a stunning price above $100, and closes the day with a comfortable double at about $80.

Seems like it would be pretty easy to get in and make some money given that type of frenzy right, even if you missed out on getting shares at the offering price. the reality may be far different though, particularly if the IPOs of companies in Facebook’s peer group over the last year-plus are any indication.

According to SigFig, which tracks more than $30 billion in retail brokerage accounts synced by its users, buy the time investors have gotten involved in stocks like LinkedIn, Groupon and Zynga on IPO day the price has already jumped and dashed hopes for a quick score.

In a look at six companies – LinkedIn, Groupon, Zynga, Pandora Media, Jive Software and Yelp! – SigFig found that the majority of investors who tried to flip the stock on IPO day did so at a loss. the vast majority of people who bought stock in these tech companies on IPO days have sold, the data show, and only investors in Jive averaged a positive return.

The clear culprit in the trends spotted by SigFig is that most investors are not getting in at the offering price. With LinkedIn, for instance, the average purchase price on IPO day of $98 was more than double the $45 price those who got access to the deal paid. While that premium is the extreme case, the average on most of the others was between 17% and 60% with Zynga, which actually closed below its offering price on its first day of trading, the only stock the average buyer got into without paying extra.

SigFig’s data also showed that first-day investors are not the buy-and-hold type. of the accounts synced to its service, which spread across more than 70 brokerage firms, no more than 41% of first-day buyers in any one offering are still holding their shares. they didn’t make out great by selling either: buyers at the average first-day price who sold that same day gained just 1% on LinkedIn and Yelp, the only two that garnered positive returns for the first-day flippers SigFig tracked, while losing 2% on Pandora, 3% on Groupon, 1% on Jive and 7% on Zynga.

It is important to remember that all of these companies are in their relative infancy — LinkedIn, which went public first on May 19, 2011, has been publicly-traded for less than a year — and the lack of success for first-day flippers does not necessarily cast any shadows on their ability to deliver for shareholders over the long term. the data do show, however, that for all the frenzy around a hot offering, flipping shares on the first day of trading is no guaranteed winner. Check out SigFig’s infographic below (click to enlarge).

Follow @SchaeferStreet on Twitter, or subscribe to updates on Facebook or Forbes at the top of this post. for full Forbes coverage of the Facebook IPO, click here.

Wannabe Facebook IPO Flippers Should Watch Out (Infographic)