A Connecticut man charged with killing his wife in 1984 went on trial Thursday, three years after her skeletal remains were found under a barn floor on their former property in Newtown.
John Heath, 70, of Bridgewater, is being tried in Danbury Superior Court. He said he’s innocent and doesn’t know what happened to his wife, Elizabeth, when she vanished in 1984, shortly after he filed for divorce. The couple’s daughter was 4 at the time.
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Jordan Wright, of Redding, the current owner of Heath’s former property in Newtown, testified Thursday that he and his father found skeletal remains in 2010 after tearing up the barn floor, The News-Times reported (http://bit.ly/1fJAcA6 ). Officials later determined the remains were those of Elizabeth Heath.
Wright said he tore up the floor because it was rotted. He found a dry well underneath.
“And in that we found a garbage bag and a human femur,” he said.
The medical examiner’s office determined that Elizabeth Heath died from blows to the head.
Jurors were shown several dozen images of the skeletal remains. A state police detective testified they were wrapped in bedding and garbage bags and other items found in the well.
Elizabeth Heath’s sister-in-law told police that Elizabeth feared her husband was going to kill her and said that if anything happened to her, “you know that John did it,” according to an arrest warrant affidavit.
Former Newtown police Detective Robert Tbardzik testified that John Heath filed a missing person report about his wife in 1984 and said she disappeared with only the clothes she was wearing and $600.
A year later, Heath married a woman who babysat for his daughter, authorities said.
He was arrested after the remains were found.
