Martha "Sunny" von Bulow, the heiress who spent the last 28 years of her life in a coma after what prosecutors alleged in a pair of sensational trials were two murder attempts by her husband, died Saturday at age 76.

She died at a nursing home in New York, her children said in a statement issued by family spokeswoman Maureen Connelly.

Martha von Bulow was a personification of romantic notions about high society -- a stunning heiress who brought her American millions to marriages to men who gave her honored old European names.

But she ended her days in a coma, giving no sign of awareness as she was visited by her children and tended around the clock by nurses.

The murder case split Newport society, produced lurid headlines and was later made into a film, "Reversal of Fortune," starring Glenn Close and Jeremy Irons. The film was based on a book by Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz who handled the appeal and second trial.

Claus von Bulow is living in London, "mostly taking care of his grandchildren," said Dershowitz.

"I'm sure Claus is very sad today," he said. The lawyer called Sunny von Bulow's death "a sad ending to a sad tragedy that some people tried to turn into a crime. It was never a crime."