HAMILTON — A jury in Ravalli County handed down a guilty verdict Thursday for a double murder that happened in Superior over a year ago.
Kraig Walter Benson was found guilty of deliberate homicide for the murders of Jenny Benson and Logan Gardner that occurred at a Superior bar in August 2023.
He is now awaiting sentencing at a later date and his bond has been revoked.
Benson's trial in Ravalli County for a double homicide that occurred in Mineral County lasted for several days.
Benson's defense was seeking a conviction of mitigated deliberate homicide, which carries a lesser sentence compared to deliberate homicide.
But in closing arguments on Thursday, the prosecution argued the evidence went against the lesser charge.
The jury deliberated for several hours Thursday afternoon before reaching the guilty verdict.
ORIGINAL REPORT: October 25, 2024
The man accused of killing his wife and a bartender in Superior in August 2023, has been found guilty.
A jury in Hamilton on Thursday found Kraig Walter Benson guilty of deliberate homicide and of using a weapon in the offense.
He had been charged in the shooting deaths of Jenny Benson and Logan Gardner at the Four Aces Bar.
Benson was found not guilty of mitigated deliberate homicide.
The sentencing date for Benson has not yet been set.
Defense attorneys had argued that Benson was in extreme emotional distress at the time of the shooting because he had just learned of an alleged affair between his wife and Gardner.
Benson himself took the stand in his on Wednesday and testified he had no recollection of the killings.
Prosecutors countered during cross-examination that Benson was able to remember certain things Jenny Benson had said to him just before the shooting, but then testified he couldn't remember the shooting itself.
The trial had been moved from Mineral County to Hamilton in order to seat an unbiased jury. A Missoula judge presided over the case.
