A man is set to spent the rest of his days in prison after jurors found him guilty of murdering his wife at their New Hampshire home. Narcissistic defendant William Argie, 49, falsely blamed his wife Maureen Argie, 41, for his personal problems, and he killed her when she was going to leave him, prosecutors said.
Judge Marguerite Wageling sentenced him to life in prison without the possibility of parole for first-degree murder. She also sentenced him from one-and-a-half to three years for falsification of physical evidence.
The judge ripped into him from the bench.
“Your selfish, narcissistic, and possibly addicted-fueled behavior led to the devastation of your family,” she said. Not just his family or Maureen’s, but the two small children he had with his wife. “The ripple effect is going to be lifelong. Every time someone speaks of family in front of your children, they’re going to relive this pain.”
Argie testified on Friday that he found his wife hanging, dead by suicide on April 4, 2019. Prosecutor Peter Hinckley was incredulous, confronting him over leaving the home instead of calling authorities. Argie took Maureen’s car and phone, and used her debit card at a Dunkin Donuts and for a hotel room at the casino where investigators found him, the state said.
Argie was understated but passive aggressive during cross-examination, denying that he used the debit card, and sometimes answering the prosecutor’s questions with another question.
“What would 911 do, sir?” he said, downplaying his decision not to seek authorities in his version of events.
According to authorities, the reality is that Maureen was going to leave him and take the kids. She showed no signs of considering suicide, and though she was depressed, it was because she had to deal with a narcissist who was bleeding the family dry financially, Hinckley said in closing arguments on Monday.
William Argie was a gambling addict, he faced mounting debts, he faced the possibility of a car repossession, he discussed bankruptcy, and he could not hold down a steady job, authorities said. He took all this out on Maureen, they said. Friends testified that he repeatedly said he wanted to kill her, and according to one of them, he even asked him to kill her for half of the life insurance money on her.
“He would not let Maureen win,” Hinckley said. “He could not let her be free and happy.”
Family members delivered heart-wrenching statements at the sentencing on Tuesday.
“There is nothing that will make this emptiness go away, or erase the pain of knowing the true anguish that Maureen was in before her life was stolen,” Maureen’s brother said Matt Gaudet said in court. In visceral detail, he laid out how Argie’s connection to the children was severed. Argie would no longer receive calls or letters from them, or see them on Christmas morning. “They will not ask about you, or talk about you, and you will become a distant memory. You are a selfish, cowardly, pathetic person, who deserves to die alone, miserable and locked away for the rest of your life.”
Maureen’s mother Anne Gaudet addressed her statement to her.
“How does one measure loss?” she said. “How can I explain my loss to the court, to strangers?”
She missed speaking to her about everything from family to friends, books, TV shows, and recipes, she said. “I miss, miss, miss you at family gatherings, holidays, birthdays, various celebrations. You are missing and missed as a daughter, a mother, a sister, a daughter-in-law, a sister-in-law, a niece, an aunt, a cousin, a friend,” she said. Sometimes a song, the weather, a passage in a book, or a scene in a TV show may trigger a memory, she said. “Sometimes the memory is so bold, so real that the pain is like a physical punch, and sometimes the pain feels dull, like a film of sadness that will diminish my reactions to daily life, daily events. I believe my heart will always have a scar.”
Wageling voiced condolences to the family.
“Your loss is deep and it’s raw. Rightfully so. This was such a senseless, tragic,” she paused briefly, appearing to struggle with her words, “awful event.”
She voiced hope that they could find solace from witnesses who spoke so kindly of Maureen. They called her a saint, kind, thoughtful, calm, strong, understanding, patient, conscientious, and hardworking.
“There was not a negative word said about Maureen from any witness who testified during the trial, save Mr. Argie, and you should be so proud of that, and I hope find some small solace in what you heard from the witnesses,” she said.
[Screenshot via Law&Crime Network]
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