Associate Professor Of Biology Testifies: “I Did Not Find Any Burdocks.”
Published: June 19th, 2012
By: Brian Golden

Associate professor of biology testifies: “I did not find any burdocks.”

NORWICH – Day seven of the Wlasiuk murder trial found the prosecution focusing its attention on the burdocks located in alleged homicide victim Patricia Wlasiuk’s hair – and on her clothing – as well as the burdock plants discovered outside her Oxford residence.

Her husband, Peter Wlasiuk, is charged with second degree murder – a class A-1 felony – in Patricia’s death, which Chenango County District Attorney Joseph McBride has alleged took place at the couple’s New Virginia Road home in April of 2002. According to Wlasiuk, the couple was traveling east along County Road 35 in the Town of Guilford when his wife swerved to miss a deer, losing control of Wlasiuk’s 1998 GMC pick-up truck and veering into Guilford Lake, where she drowned.

Wlasiuk later changed his story, stating Patricia had purposely driven into the lake as the couple argued. He has twice been convicted of the crime, although both convictions have been successfully appealed, in 2006 and 2011, respectively.

Dr. Julian Shepherd, an associate professor of biology at Binghamton University, took the stand Monday, testifying that he found no burdocks along the lake’s shoreline, which he searched just days after the April 3, 2002 incident. According to Shepherd, he searched approximately 100 yards of shoreline, both east and west of the pick-up truck’s entry point into the water.

Said Shepherd, “I did not find any burdocks.”

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