March Jury Selection Targeted In Dabate Murder Case

ELLINGTON/ROCKVILLE, CT — Jury selection in the Richard Dabate murder case will likely begin in early March, officials at Rockville Superior Court said Tuesday.

Judge Julia Dewey presided over a hearing on the case on Tuesday afternoon. She set respective dates on two motions for Jan. 22 and Jan. 27 and set a March target for jury selection. A court official said that would liklely be early in the month.

Richard Dabate has been free on a $1 million bond since several family homes were leveraged for the bail money in April 2017,shorly after his arrest.

The case itself dates back to two days before Christmas in 2015, when 39-year-old Connie Dabate was found dead. The warrant by which Richard Dabate was charged with murder, reads like a Hollywood script with an alleged home invasion gone haywire.

A 50-page warrant not only accuses Richard Dabate of having an affair, but getting a girlfriend pregnant and then scripting an involved story that included him being tied to a chair with an intruder "manhandling" him before shooting his wife.

State police did not agree with Dabate's account of what happened and, after what they called a "long and exhaustive" investigation, arrested Dabate several months later, according to a warrant.

See the full story on Richard Dabate's arrest, including details on the arrest warrant, here.