London: A 49-year-old chef from Los Angeles faces life in prison for murder after he told police he boiled his wife`s body for four days to hide the evidence, a media report said.
According to the Daily Mirror, David Viens stuffed his wife`s body in a 55-gallon drum of boiling water and kept it submerged with weights.
In a recorded interrogation presented by prosecutors at the trial in Los Angeles, Viens was heard saying he cooked the body of his 39-year-old wife, Dawn, in 2009 until little was left but her skull.
"He treated her like a piece of meat and got rid of her," said Karen Patterson, the couple`s best friend, who was the key witness in the trial.
The chef spoke to authorities from a hospital bed in March 2011, after he leaped off a cliff in Rancho Palos Verdes in California.
Authorities said he jumped off after learning he was a suspect in the woman`s disappearance.
The trial relied heavily on recorded interviews with authorities in which the chef acknowledged the crime in detail.
"I just slowly cooked it and I ended up cooking her for four days," Viens could be heard saying.
Viens was asked what happened Oct 18, 2009, the night his wife disappeared.
He said he had noticed money missing from his restaurant and suspected his wife.
They argued, and he forced her on to the floor where he wrapped her up and put duct tape over her mouth before going to bed. He awoke to find her dead, and panicked.
Viens will be sentenced in November, and could face 15 years to life in prison.
IANS
