Shivangi Sinha
In February 1982, James Krauseneck contacted police to report that his wife had been killed in their home in Brighton, New York. He claimed to have discovered her remains and their 3-year-old daughter unharmed after returning from work. Although investigators eventually ruled out a botched robbery, the case went cold for decades. It wasn’t until 2019 that James was arrested and charged with his wife’s murder. NBC’s ‘Dateline: The Bad Man,’ and CBS’ ‘48 Hours’ episode, titled ‘The Brighton Ax Murder,’ explore the details of the case and how it was ultimately solved.
James Krauseneck Claimed Cathy Was Alive and Well When He Left For Work
James Frederick Krauseneck, Jr. was born on November 12, 1951, to Pauline Alice Pringnitz and James Frederick Krauseneck Sr. His family ran the Krausenecks Carpet and Drapery business out of Michigan, and James had quite a good upbringing. He was in high school when he met Cathleen Rose Schlosser for the first time. They quickly fell for each other and even went on to attend Western Michigan University together. They got married on May 3, 1974, and moved to Fort Collins, Colorado. James joined the graduate school at Colorado State University, and in 1979, their daughter, Sara Krauseneck, was born. The family moved briefly to Lynchburg, Virginia, where he was working as an assistant professor of economics at Lynchburg College.
When James found work as an economist at Eastman Kodak Company, he took it. Along with his family, he settled down in Brighton, New York, and seemed to be living an ordinary life. They had only been living in their new home for about six months when, on February 19, 1982, James made a frantic call to the police. He claimed that he had left for work around 6:30 am, and upon returning in the evening, he noticed the garage door was open and the glass in the door had been shattered. Inside, he said he discovered his wife lying on their bed with an axe lodged in her forehead and blood everywhere. He added that he found his daughter wandering inside the house, unharmed. He picked her up, rushed to a neighbor’s home, and they called for help.
James Krauseneck Was Arrested Over Three Decades After His First Wife’s Murder
When police arrived at the scene, they pronounced Cathleen Krauseneck dead. Several items in the house appeared to have been disturbed, and it initially looked like a burglary had taken place. However, the police had little evidence linking anyone to the crime. Soon after, James Krauseneck and his daughter, Sara, moved to Michigan to live with his parents. Authorities later alleged that James did not inform them of this move, and when they tried to reach him, only his lawyers responded. In the following years, James built a new life. He married Gayle L. Labrum in 1992, though they divorced in 1997.
In 1999, he married Sharon Marie James. He eventually relocated from Michigan to Seattle, Washington, where he worked as Vice President of Sales at Weyerhaeuser. After retiring, he settled in Arizona. James was arrested at his Arizona holiday home in 2019. The police showed up at his door, asked him a few questions, and arrested him for the murder of Cathleen. James insisted he had nothing to do with the crime, but detectives claimed they had uncovered new evidence. According to updated forensic analysis, his first wife had been killed between 4:30 am and 6:30 am, a time frame during which he was still at home before leaving for work.
The cold case reinvestigation also revealed that the crime scene appeared staged. Although items were scattered throughout the house, no valuables were missing, and it no longer looked like a genuine burglary. It also emerged that James had lied to his employer about having a doctorate, and police theorized that Cathleen may have discovered this, leading to a violent confrontation. He was extradited to New York and charged with second-degree murder, to which he pleaded not guilty.
James Krauseneck Passed Away From a Terminal Illness
James Krauseneck’s trial finally took place in 2022. His defense team questioned the reliability of the forensic evidence presented by the prosecution, calling it disputable. They also proposed an alternative suspect, Ed Laraby, who was a convicted felon out of prison and living nearby at the time. The defense referenced a confession from 2014 in which Laraby admitted to attacking a housewife in Brighton, New York. However, prosecutors countered this by noting that Laraby described his victim as having dark hair and being thin, and these traits did not align with Cathleen.
It was also emphasized that while Laraby had a history of assaulting women, he had never committed murder, making it unlikely he was responsible for Cathleen’s death. Eventually, James was convicted on September 26, 2022, and sentenced to 25 years in prison on November 7. During the sentencing, his daughter, Sara Krauseneck, defended him, expressing that she felt she had lost both her parents and that the justice system had let her family down. He was incarcerated at Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, New York. Just six months later, on May 5, 2023, he died from Esophageal Cancer, a diagnosis he received shortly after the trial concluded. His conviction was vacated due to his death.
Read More: Sara Krauseneck: What Happened to Cathy and James’ Daughter?
