90-year-old husband bludgeons 89-year-old wife to death

Knight of the Bleach Join date : 2009-06-10

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Quote :: A feeble-looking John H. Bunz had to be held up by two court officers after the 90-year-old stumbled getting from his wheelchair into his seat at the defense table Wednesday in a downtown courtroom.

It's hard to comprehend, but this is the same man who bludgeoned his 89-year-old wife to death with a hammer in a bloody attack during March in their Amherst apartment.

Bunz showed little emotion as he apologized for his crime shortly before receiving what some deemed a "death sentence" -- 17 1/2 years in prison -- in State Supreme Court.

"I'm extremely sorry about what happened," said Bunz, who turns 91 in November.

The retired Niagara Mohawk technician will become the second-oldest inmate in the New York State prison system when he begins serving his sentence.

The oldest inmate is a pedophile and the third-oldest is a guy who killed several women, including his own wife.

Quote :: Bunz pleaded guilty in July to first-degree manslaughter in the killing of Virginia H. Bunz, his wife of nearly 68 years, in the couple's apartment in the Amberleigh Retirement Community.

In interviews Wednesday, authorities offered new details about the attack, which occurred early on March 21.

Sometime after getting up that morning, Virginia and John Bunz got into a quarrel over "her health care issues," said Amherst Police Detective Lt. Richard S. Walter.

Walter said he could not be more specific about the nature of those issues; Amberleigh's executive director previously told The Buffalo News that Virginia Bunz was in good health for her age but had been slowed by a hip injury.

"She gets agitated -- he gets agitated," Walter said in explaining the crime. "At some point, he gets a hammer from somewhere in the home."

John Bunz hit his wife about 30 times with the hammer, police and prosecutors said, first in the hands as she tried to defend herself and then repeatedly in the head.

"It was an extremely violent crime scene," Walter said.

Virginia Bunz died from blunt-force trauma from the beating, but John Bunz still grabbed a pillow afterward and held it over her face "to make sure the job was done," Walter said.

He then grabbed a kitchen knife and cut himself above his eyes, on his neck and on his wrists in an apparent suicide attempt.