On this day, Oct. 6, in 1998, the murder trial began for former Delaware Deputy Attorney General Thomas Capano, accused of killing his lover, a 28-year-old secretary to the governor. Prosecutors said Capano killed Anne Marie Fahey and stuffed her body in a cooler. He and his brother took a boat 62 miles into the Atlantic Ocean and tossed the cooler overboard.
When the cooler failed to sink, he shot holes in it. Still, the ice chest floated. Capano pulled the body out and wrapped it with anchor chains.
Neither her body nor the murder weapon were ever recovered. Prosecutors built the case on circumstantial evidence, including entries from Fahey’s diary in which she called Capano a “jealous maniac.”
Capano’s brother was a witness for the prosecution, and Capano was convicted and was sentenced to life.
-Scott McCabe
