Republican voters in Indiana helped a candidate jailed on charges that he killed his wife win a primary election for a township board seat.
Voters cast their ballots for Andrew Wilhoite, a man who — more than two months before the primary election — was arrested and charged with beating his cancer-striken wife to death and dumping her body in a creek.
In March, Nikki Wilhoite had just finished her final round of chemotherapy. Around the same time, she learned her husband had allegedly been cheating on her, so she filed for a legal separation.
On 24 March, the couple began arguing about the affair and the pending divorce when Mr Wilhoit allegedly hit his wife with a gallon-sized, cement flower pot. Prosecutors claim he then drove her body to a bridge near their home and dumped her over.
The Daily Beast reports that after Ms Wilhoite failed to show up for work, her colleagues became worried and asked the police to conduct a wellness check. When police arrived at the home, three of the man's children greeted them and said Ms Wilhoite was not home and that they also could not contact her.
At that point, Mr Wilhoite arrived on his tractor, and he admitted to police the pair had a fight. He claimed his wife slept on the couch that night and that when he woke up, she had disappeared.
When police learned from Ms Wilhoite's father that she was going to divorce him — and he showed concern that Mr Wilhoite had done something to his daughter — they became sceptical of the Republican candidate's story.
They searched Mr Wilhoite's home and found blood on his bedsheets and pillow, as well as small droplets around the door and inside the master bathroom and sink.
After confronting Mr Wilhoite and questioning him about what transpired, police claim he eventually claimed she had attacked him, and then admitted to throwing "Elizabeth out the front door of the house" before hurling a "cement, gallon-sized flower pot that had dirt in it" that hit her in the face.
“Elizabeth fell to the ground and Andrew stated he didn’t know what to do so he took Elizabeth’s body, placed it in his pickup, and threw it in a nearby creek that is east of the residence,” prosecutors claim. They also claimed Mr Wilhoite collected the broken pieces of the pot and put them in a plastic bag.
He reportedly told investigators he did not know if his wife was still breathing when he tossed her in the creek, allegedly admitting that he did not check.
Since then, he has been held at the Boone County Jail. Despite the existing evidence, he still managed to win a primary for the town's board. He received 60 votes and will appear on the November ballot for the Clinton Township Board.
If he is convicted, he will not be eligible to serve as an elected official.
