SALEM, Mass. — Jurors in Massachusetts have reached a verdict in the trial of a Massachusetts teenager who raped and killed his high school math teacher.
He was found guilty of first degree murder, one count of aggravated rape, and armed robbery. He was found not guilty on another aggravated rape charge. Prosecutors said Chism raped his teacher in the bathroom of the school and again in the woods.
It took jurors about 9 hours of deliberations over two days to reach their verdict.
A prosecutor says Philip Chism “knew right from wrong and could choose right from wrong.”
But a defense attorney says the then-14-year-old Chism was in “the throes of mental illness” when he killed 24-year-old Colleen Ritzer in 2013, shortly after he moved to Massachusetts from Clarksville, Tennessee.
Chism now faces life with the possibility of parole after 15-25 years.
Prosecutors say Chism strangled Ritzer and stabbed her with a box cutter in a Danvers High School bathroom, then used a trash bin to bring her body into nearby woods.
Assistant District Attorney Kate MacDougall told the jurors that doing something awful doesn’t make you crazy.
Defense attorney Denise Regan said jurors must be certain beyond a reasonable doubt that Chism wasn’t mentally ill.
