The first-degree manslaughter charge originally filed against a man accused of killing his wife at their South Windsor condominium in May has been upgraded to murder, online court records show.
Hartford Superior Court prosecutors have filed the upgraded charge against Tahj Hutchinson, 23, in the death of his wife, Jessica Edwards, 30. The couple formerly lived in the Cinnamon Springs condominium complex off Pleasant Valley Road.
Hutchinson had originally been charged with first-degree manslaughter. He is being held in lieu of $1.5 million bond at the Cheshire Correctional Institution and is next due in Hartford Superior Court on Dec. 20, online records show.
Under Connecticut law, murder carries 25 to 60 years in prison, while first-degree manslaughter carries up to 20 years.
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Other charges newly filed against Hutchinson are risk of injury to a child, which carries up to 10 years in prison, and evidence tampering, which carries up to five years.
Jessica Edwards’ sister, Yanique Edwards, said today that her family had been “looking for” the murder charge, explaining that the family hopes it will lead to a longer sentence “so he won’t hurt anyone else.”
Both murder and first-degree manslaughter involve causing a person’s death, but they differ in the defendant’s mental state.
Murder requires that the defendant intended to kill the victim. The provision of the first-degree manslaughter law that Hutchinson was originally charged with violating involves extreme recklessness that creates “a grave risk of death to another person.”
Because there is rarely direct evidence as to the defendant’s mental state, a jury usually has to rely on circumstantial evidence to reach conclusions on that issue.
Hutchinson told police on May 21 — the day Edwards’ body was found in East Hartford — that he and Edwards had argued throughout the day Saturday, May 8, according to an affidavit by South Windsor police Officer Daniel Cain.
The officer went on to recount that Hutchinson said the following in the interview, which took place outside his parents’ house on Fairview Street in Manchester: He said the argument grew into a physical confrontation on Sunday, May 9. At some point during the day, Hutchinson said, he pushed Edwards hard, and she hit her head on something, causing her ear to bleed. She left that evening to go to her mother’s house and pick up their son, and the argument resumed when she returned.
When they woke up on Monday morning, May 10, they continued arguing. Hutchinson said she hit him in the head with a laptop and grabbed a kitchen knife, that they wrestled over the knife, and he eventually pinned her on the living room floor, with Edwards on her back and Hutchinson on top.
As they struggled, he said, he eventually managed to flip her over onto her stomach and knelt on her back and neck area, holding her down. He said she eventually stopped moving and, not knowing what had happened, he got up and tended to their son. When he came back later and found Edwards not moving or responding, he realized she was “not alive.”
He said he left her on the floor and tended to their son throughout the day while her family was calling trying to locate her. He said he backed his sport utility vehicle up to the door and loaded her body into it, leaving when her family came over. He said he drove to a “random GPS” location, dragged her body into the woods, then drove to the East Hartford police station to report her missing, showing up barefoot because his shoes got too muddy while he disposed of the body.
Police found Edwards’ body 11 days later, on the morning of May 21, as they searched the wooded area between East Hartford Middle School and Labor Field.
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