Crime & Safety
Accused East Hartford Cold Case Killer Now Dead: Reports
The 77-year-old inmate, accused of brutally stabbing and killing a 21-year-old woman in 1973, was found unresponsive in his holding cell.
EAST HARTFORD, CT — Less than two weeks after being charged in a brutal cold case killing from 1973, the man East Hartford police said stabbed and killed a 21-year-old woman is now dead himself.
According to WFSB Channel 3, George Legere of Massachusetts was found unresponsive in his cell at the MacDougall-Walker Correctional Institute late Friday, Oct. 3, at 11 p.m.
Legere was then pronounced dead at a nearby hospital Saturday morning, WFSB reported, citing the Connecticut Department of Correction.
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On Sept. 25, the East Hartford Police Department announced the closure of a cold case homicide investigation with the arrest of the 77-year-old Legere for the murder of 21-year-old Janet Couture in October 1973.
According to online court records, he was charged with one count of murder, a Class A felony.
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His bond for the charge was $1 million, though Legere was incarcerated in the state for another crime.
Legere was expected to appear in Manchester Superior Court on Wednesday, Oct. 8.
According to the state's Division of Criminal Justice, this was the oldest cold case in the state before the arrest was announced.
On Sept. 19, 2025, an arrest warrant was issued charging Legere with murder for the killing of Couture, who was found stabbed to death in her Cannon Road home in East Hartford on Oct. 13, 1973.
Couture was home alone when Legere entered her residence through a window, committing "this heinous crime that shocked the community and remained under investigation for over five decades," wrote the EHPD late last month.
East Hartford detectives dedicated themselves to re-examining evidence and following leads over the last 53 years, according to the EHPD.
Police said a breakthrough came in 2021, when the Avon Police Department arrested Legere for kidnapping a woman in a separate 1984 cold case. He was serving a 25-year prison sentence for that crime.
WVIT Channel 30 reported that the cause of Legere's death is unknown and the medical examiner is investigating.
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