This article was originally published on GoErie.com by Madeleine O’Neill on February 6, 2019
Prosecutors charge that John P. Grazioli was plotting how to get his new wife, Amanda Grazioli, out of his life in the months before he shot her at their Millcreek Township home.
Evidence shown in court Wednesday showed John Grazioli sought out an extramarital affair using a phone messaging app in the weeks before Amanda Grazioli’s March 8 shooting death.
“I’m looking for a young sexy woman to pleasure,” one of the messages read. “I’m married and she is not giving me what I need at all.”
The message was sent from an account associated with John Grazioli’s phone, Erie County Detective Anne Styn testified.
Chief Deputy District Attorney Erin Connelly also presented evidence Tuesday that Grazioli, 45, had told his ex-wife he planned to divorce Amanda Grazioli in the weeks before the killing.
The prosecution is asking the jury to convict John Grazioli of first-degree murder, or a premeditated killing, in the shooting.
Grazioli’s lawyer, Brian Arrowsmith, told jurors on Tuesday that John Grazioli does not dispute causing his wife’s death by shooting her. Rather, Arrowsmith said, the defense will argue that Grazioli did not commit first-degree murder by shooting his wife maliciously or with the specific intent to kill her.
Grazioli would face a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole if convicted of first-degree murder in the shooting. Prosecutors said that Grazioli shot his wife in the back of the head and then left her body in bed at the couple’s Forest Crossing residence in the Whispering Woods subdivision in Millcreek.
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