GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ) – The jury foreman in the George Burch murder trial is speaking out.
Burch found guilty Thursday in the death of Nicole Vanderheyden in 2016.
Rachel Hillery says the group reached its decision quickly after only two votes.
“Initially, we just went over everything to see if there were any questions anybody had.”
She says the Brown County D-A’s closing argument brought all the evidence from over the past two weeks together to make a rock solid case.
But that doesn’t mean there weren’t moments where Burch’s story that Vanderheyden’s boyfriend, Douglas Detrie, did the killing, seemed plausible.
“He would make me believe that maybe he didn’t do it.”
But the D-N-A evidence, G-P-S coordinates, and blood where there shouldn’t have been any, convinced her.
But Hillery says even with all that, and the eventual solid belief they got the verdict right, sending a man to prison for perhaps the rest of his life isn’t an easy choice to make.
“It’s tough because you have to live with this decision now for the rest of your life.”
She describes her fellow jurors as thoughtful and worked well together.
