A woman who struck and killed a famed Hamptons realtor on a foggy highway this summer did briefly stop her SUV, but only to disentangle the victim’s suitcase from her vehicle’s undercarriage, prosecutors have alleged.
Amanda Kempton, a 32-year-old marine biologist from Virginia, has pleaded not guilty to charges of leaving the scene of a deadly crash after police say she fatally hit former Netflix star Sara Burack on Long Island at around 2:26 a.m. on June 19.
At the time, Kempton’s lawyer told the court that she believed she had only hit a traffic cone and didn’t notice she was dragging Burack’s suitcase behind her until she got home.
But in a press release announcing Kempton’s indictment on Monday, Suffolk County prosecutors alleged that she had actually stopped “immediately after the crash” to unsuccessfully try to dislodge the suitcase from under her 2004 Toyota Highlander.
Instead of trying to help Burack or report the collision to law enforcement, Kempton simply disposed of the suitcase and its contents in a local dumpster, prosecutors claimed.
“Leaving the scene of a fatal collision makes a tragic situation even worse,” said District Attorney Raymond A. Tierney.
“Rather than rendering help to Ms. Burack, the defendant allegedly left her to die. This indictment is an important step towards justice for Sara and her loved ones.”
A judge ordered Kempton held on cash or bond until their next scheduled court appearance on November 20.
Burack, 40, shot to national fame in the 2020 Netflix reality show Million Dollar Beach House, which followed her and her colleagues at luxury real estate agency Nest Seekers International as they vied with each other to flog multi-million-dollar homes in the Hamptons.
Yet by June 2025, Burack’s close friend and ex-boyfriend Mike White told The New York Post, she was in the grip of a deep mental health crisis, suffering from paranoia and not eating regularly while spending her time at the library “constantly researching things for no clear reason”.
White said Burack had sold off her car and her condo to become “homeless by choice”, after a period of extreme workaholism where she often took Adderall to work through the night.
That is apparently how Burack ended up wheeling her pink suitcase along the side of the West Montauk Highway near Springville Road in Hampton Bays in the small hours of June 19.
Prosecutors say that Kempton, who was staying with a friend while visiting her family, left Burack for dead on the side of the road. It wasn’t until around 2:45 a.m. that she was spotted by another passing motorist, who stopped and called 911.
Burack was taken to Stony Brook University Hospital with sever head trauma and multiple broken bones. She died of her injuries later that afternoon.
