John Eligon of the NY Times reports, "Shuffling one foot at a time with the help of an oak cane, the son of Brooke Astor began an unsteady journey on Monday.
With his wife clutching one arm and one of his lawyers the other, the son, Anthony Marshall, 84, made his way up the steep staircase of a Manhattan courthouse. He went on trial on Monday, 16 months after he was charged with defrauding his mother, the queen of New York society and philanthropy, out of millions of dollars by taking advantage of her declining mental health. Coincidentally, the case opened on what would have been her 107th birthday. Mrs. Astor died two years ago."