John Heath of Connecticut charged in wife’s 1984 murder
John Heath, 68, of Bridgewater, Conn., has been charged with the murder of his wife, Elizabeth Gough Heath, 28 years ago.
A 68-year-old Connecticut man has been arrested and charged in the 1984 killing of his wife, who was reported missing just days after he filed for divorce.
John Heath of Bridgewater was arrested by warrant on Monday and charged with murder. Bail was set at $1 million Tuesday in Superior Court in Danbury, the Hartford Courant reported.
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The skeletal remains of 32-year-old Elizabeth Gough Heath were found beneath the subflooring of a Newtown barn by a father and son in April 2010, according to the Courant.
An autopsy found that she had died of blunt traumatic head injury.
Land records show that John Heath owned the property until 2005, when he lost the property to foreclosure. He reported his wife missing on April 6, 1984, Hartford TV station WVIT reported.
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The Heaths were married in May 1978. They had one child, Meghann, who was born in September 1979, according to the Newtown Bee.
Following his wife's disappearance, John Heath obtained a divorce on the grounds of desertion. He remarried in 1985, the Newtown Bee reported.
Friends told the Hartford Courtant they were long suspicious of John Heath's claim that his wife just left, saying Elizabeth Gough Heath was a devoted mother to her then-4-year-old daughter.
"She just wouldn't up and leave," friend Barbara DeLong told the newspaper in 2010.
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