John Jefferson
Insets, top to bottom: Tanya Vuichard (Casterline Funeral Home) and Vincent Vuichard (Michigan Department of Corrections). Background: The home where Vincent Vuichard killed his wife (The Detroit News).
A 66-year-old man in Michigan will be spending the remainder of his days behind bars for brutally killing his wife inside of their home, slitting her throat and telling investigators that he and the victim had been “getting into it.”
A jury in Oakland County on Tuesday unanimously voted to find Vincent F. Vuichard guilty of first-degree murder in the 2021 slaying of 59-year-old Tanya Vuichard, authorities announced.
According to a news release from the Oakland County District Attorney’s Office, Vincent Vuichard beat and ultimately murdered Tanya Vuichard “on or just before” May 17, 2021.
Deputies with the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office on May 19, 2021, responded to a call requesting a welfare check on Tanya Vuichard at her home in Michigan’s Commerce Township, which is about 35 miles northwest of Detroit.
The initial call for a welfare check came from Tanya Vuichard’s colleagues at Novi Public School District, where she had been an administrative assistant for 30 years, The Detroit News reported. The colleagues reportedly contacted law enforcement after she failed to show up for work.
Detectives then went to her home and were left waiting for “some time” after knocking on the front door before Vincent Vuichard let them inside.
When Vincent Vuichard did open the door, deputies said he had what appeared to be deep fingernail scratches on his face and blood on his shoe, local news website Hometown Life reported. When asked about his injuries, Vincent Vuichard reportedly explained that he and his wife had “got into it” the previous night. He then claimed that she was out running errands.
Once inside, detectives said they “found a comforter covering something on the bathroom floor.”
When detectives asked him what the blanket was, Vincent Vuichard reportedly responded, “My wife.” She was pronounced dead on the scene from “multiple slash and stab wounds.”
During Vincent Vuichard’s six-day trial, he attempted to assert an insanity defense, prosecutors said. The jurors on the case took less than one day of deliberation before all 12 voted to convict him of first-degree murder. Under Michigan state law, a defendant convicted of first-degree murder is subject to a mandatory sentence of life in a state correctional facility without the opportunity for parole.
“Tanya Vuichard was a mother, grandmother, friend, and coworker — her senseless murder is a huge loss to the community,” Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald said in a statement after the conviction. “My office spent the last three years working alongside her children to get justice for Tanya, and I applaud the trial team for securing a first-degree murder conviction in this very difficult case.”
Vincent Vuichard will remain incarcerated at the Oakland County Jail until his sentencing hearing, which is currently scheduled to take place on Feb. 6, 2025, at 1:30 p.m. before Oakland County Circuit Court Judge Jacob Cunningham.
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