The case of a former South Barrington man accused of killing his wife 18 years ago inched closer to trial Wednesday when a Cook County judge ruled that statements the woman made to several friends about her husband could be admitted as evidence.
Frank Buschauer, 69, currently of Pell Lake, Wis., and free on $2 million bond, was charged in 2013 with murder in the death of Cynthia Hrisco.
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Prosecutors said Buschauer killed his wife in a rage after a running, bitter dispute over construction problems in their home, built by Buschauer’s cousin. The couple was seeing a marriage counselor and other therapists.
The case has been going through legal gymnastics for the past five years, including a judge’s ruling that eliminated key prosecution evidence, a lengthy appeal of that ruling which restored it, and a change of judges.
In Wednesday’s hearing, the case’s new judge, Joseph Cataldo, ruled that the three witnesses could testify for the prosecution about private statements Hrisco made to them prior to her death. The testimony could be damaging to Buschauer, who admitted to police that at one point he told his wife during an argument, “I could kill you.”
Defense attorney Allan Ackerman argued that such testimony is excluded because it is hearsay and not allowable under court rules.
Assistant State’s Attorney Maria McCarthy argued that the statements could be evidence to show motivation for the murder, which is allowable. One of the statements McCarthy cited was one in which Hrisco described Buschauer as a “Jekyll and Hyde.”
“This goes right to the heart of the why the defendant killed his wife,” McCarthy argued.
Ackerman responded by saying that none of the testimony was corroborated by any reports of abuse or other documentation and that Hrisco had told her physician two years before her death that she had not been abused and “felt safe.”
Hrisco was 47 when her body was found in the master bathroom of the South Barrington home in the early morning hours of Feb. 28, 2000. Buschauer said he found her unresponsive in the hot tub and pulled her out, laying her on the floor. Prosecutors allege that an enraged Buschauer held her forcibly underwater in the tub, killing her.
The manner of Hrisco’s death was originally ruled as undetermined, but a review of the case in 2010 by South Barrington police and the Cook County state’s attorney’s office led to charges against Buschauer. Subsequent pathology examinations found wounds on her neck, scalp and left eye along with abrasions to her nose, chin, abdomen, knees, arms and knuckles, and the death was reclassified as a homicide, prosecutors said.
Authorities removed the hot tub from the home, no longer owned by Buschauer, and placed it in a nearby location to conduct a re-enactment of the murder scene.
Hrisco had a doctorate in nutrition and Buschauer was an engineer. The two had adopted a child before her death.
The case will continue July 13 at the Rolling Meadows courthouse with further hearings. Ackerman has filed a motion to dismiss the murder indictment against his client.
George Houde is a freelance reporter.