PENNSYLVANIA
Citizens Voice
By Denis J. O’Malley (Staff Writer)
Published: January 23, 2013
After less than two hours of deliberation, a Monroe County jury on Tuesday convicted the former pastor accused of killing his second wife in 2008 with first-degree murder.
The relatively quick decision, which also found Arthur Schirmer, 64, guilty of tampering with or fabricating physical evidence for staging a car crash on Route 715 in Jackson Twp. to explain Betty Jean Schirmer’s death, came after an 11-day trial that saw nearly 60 witnesses testify.
Schirmer, who served as pastor at Reeders United Methodist Church at the time of the murder, showed hardly any reaction as he stood listening to the jury forewoman report the guilty verdict at about 4:20 p.m.
Just a few feet behind him on the other side of the courtroom’s wooden gallery barrier, Mr. Schirmer’s two daughters and his fiancée buried their heads in their hands and wept.
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