Here's a tribute written by one of Darnay Hoffman's friends:
http://www.timessquaregossip.com/2011/05/famed-lawyer-darnay-hoffmans-suicide.html
This is a very hard story for me to write today. I have been in tears throughout the weekend. My friend and lawyer Darnay Hoffman committed suicide last week at the home of his ex-wife, the elegant Mayflower Madame, Sydney Biddle Barrows.
No one knew they divorced a few years back. It was kept quiet, because we knew there would be a media frenzy. I even kept quiet. I don't think it was anything that anyone did, I think they just grew apart. They still remained good friends and I know they cared for each other very much. Darnay loved two women in his life. Sydney Biddle Barrows and his sister Toni. He adored them.
I think things got bad a few years back for Darnay. He had tried to commit suicide back then. He did it at the apartment he shared with Sydney on 70th street. I think the pressure of always helping everyone finally got to him. He always had to be the knight in shinning armor. He always had to save his family and friends. If you had Darnay as a friend, you were protected.
Darnay was never in the lawyer business to make money. Most clients he never charged, because most of his clients had no money, but they needed help and that was what was important to Darnay. He even spent his own money to help them. Darnay helped people who had nothing and asked for nothing.
Darnay Hoffman also had many high profile clients. The subway gunman Bernie Goetz, convicted child killer Joel Steinberg. He was involved in the JonBenet Ramsey case. But his most important clients were people who had no where else to turn. Over the years he took on cases for me against several landlords and he always won. He took on a magazine for me in Australia that refused to pay. He got the money. Recently he won two cases against a New York Newspaper that were suing my friends. I got the plaintiffs Darnay and he defended them and won. Anyone I ever sent to Darnay, got the best. If you had money, you got the best. If you had nothing, you got the best. Every case was important to Darnay and he was a master of the law.
I can only tell you some of the information I received from sources. I know much more, but I'm not saying more. I have lost a great friend and Darnay could never be replaced. I don't know what made him commit suicide. He was loved by so many people. He protected us and was what a true friend should be. I do not think there will be a funeral. I hear he's sitting in the morgue. I'm being told there's no money to bury him. Horrible end for a wonderful human being. May he rest in peace.....
by James Edstrom at Times Square Gossip