A jury of three men and nine women convicted Hipshire of those two charges on March 24 following deliberations that lasted two hours and forty-five minutes after three days of testimony.
Before sentencing Hipshire to five years in prison with credit for the time he had already served in jail since his arrest in July of 2009, Hipshire said, "Nothing your Honor," when asked if he had anything to say.
County prosecutor Kelly Ormsby III said, "Your Honor, no one deserves to die the way Maryanne Hipshire died in this case. By the defendant's own admission he hadn't checked on her for about 40 hours from a Monday afternoon to early Wednesday morning Feb. 18, 2009, when he found her dead." She was in the couple's rural New Madison area home. Hipshire called 911 at 4:44 a.m. for help.
Ormsby asked Judge Hein to give Hipshire at least five years in prison. The maximum he could have gotten on the two charges was 11 1/2 years.
Defense attorney Paul Wagner ask the judge for a community controlled sanction, which is the old probation. "Hipshire has been in the jail since July of last year. I also ask the court to grant him time served since his arrest over 270 days ago," said Wagner.
The judge had a lot to say from the bench before adjourning court. "This kind of death without any dignity at all is really even unfair and demeaning to animals. It's a tough statement, but it's accurate. Most people wouldn't even have their animals put down in that fashion. That's disgusting," he said.
According to Ormsby, the coroner ruled that Mrs. Hipshire died as the result of a severe bladder infection which spread to her colon, as well as dehydration and kidney failure.