MORRISTOWN, N.J. (AP) - The lawyer for a former New Jersey teacher acknowledges his client killed her retired policeman boyfriend but says she did it in self-defense.
Prosecutors say 52-year-old Virginia Vertetis gunned down 51-year-old Patrick Gilhuley while he was trying to break up with her in her Mount Olive home in March 2014.
During a status conference Tuesday, prosecutors said they were awaiting DNA test results.
Defense lawyer Edward Bilinkas says Vertetis shot Gilhuley with a gun he had left at her home. He says the defense plans to file a self-defense motion.
Bilinkas told The Daily Record of Parsippany (https://dailyre.co/1A09ErO ) he hopes to elicit testimony on the reasons his client feared for her life.
Vertetis was a math teacher in Wharton. Gilhuley was a retired New York City policeman.
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Information from: Daily Record (Parsippany, N.J.), https://www.dailyrecord.com
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