Massachusetts man Brian Walshe, aka the “I didn’t kill my wife I just found her dead, panicked, butchered her corpse, and disposed of the parts” guy, was convicted of first-degree murder on Monday, ABC News reports on what had been a novel defense case not quite flying with the jury.

Prior to the trial, the 50 year-old Walshe pleaded guilty to misleading a police investigation and improper conveyance of a human body in an attempt to sell the court on the idea that yes his late wife, 39 year-old Ana Walshe, was in a relationship with another guy and had options for her and the three boys, now aged 4 through 8, that she’d had with Brian while he was heading to federal prison on a fraud charge. Yes, he’d Googled divorce lawyers in the days prior to her disappearance on January 1, 2023. And yes, she was dead that morning. BUT he didn’t do it, he just found her dead in bed, and then proceeded to dismember her corpse in a panic because nobody would believe him that she had suddenly died of natural causes during that particular stretch of time.

So that’s why he pleaded guilty to those counts. Not the murder though. That his team contested in front of the jury and lost, possibly because “Ways to dispose of body parts after murder” was in his search history. We’ll never know if “Ways to dispose of body parts after accidental death” might have given the jury a little less to work with when weighing if the burden of proof had been met.