Jury convicts David Pietz for strangling wife to death in Lynnwood
Oct 14, 2013, 1:49 PM | Updated: 1:59 pm
A jury in Seattle has convicted David Pietz of second-degree murder in the strangling death of his wife Nicole in 2006. (AP via Facebook)
(AP via Facebook)
A jury in Seattle has convicted a Lynnwood man of second-degree murder in the strangling death of his wife Nicole in 2006.
Jurors began deliberating Thursday in the high-profile murder trial of David Pietz, 36.
The defense had argued Nicole Pietz was a recovering drug addict who relapsed and was likely killed by a dangerous criminal or unknown drug dealer.
David Pietz claimed he went to sleep with his wife and she was gone when he woke up. But prosecutors said she was still wearing a dental appliance she only wore at night when her body was discovered in a wooded area of Burien a week after she was reported missing. And they said a cell phone call from the victim’s phone made the morning after Pietz reported her disappearance came from an area near his workplace, showing he was trying to make it appear she was still alive.
Nicole Pietz was reportedly on her way to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting the night she disappeared, and despite getting a prescription for painkillers from her doctor for a back injury, her lawyer and friends argued she had not relapsed.
Prosecutors alleged David Pietz was unhappy in his marriage and had a number of affairs with other women. He refused to testify in his own defense during the trial.
