Jury selected for 2003 murder trial

KALAMAZOO, Mich. (WOOD) - It was Besham Sugrim's wife who went to police and told them that her husband killed Linda Gibson in 2003.

On Tuesday, the jury was selected that will decide if Sugrim is guilty of that murder.

It wasn't until her husband was in jail that Bernadette Sugrim felt safe enough to tell police that her husband told her that he killed a woman.

Besham Sugrim was arrested in May 2011 for allegedly severely beating his 11-year-old daughter.

In August, a judge granted the prosecution's request that Sugrim be charged with the first-degree murder of Gibson.

According to testimony by Sugrim's wife, he came home in 2003 and told her that he had killed a woman and gotten rid of the body.

Gibson's naked, badly beaten and stabbed body was found in the 2200 block of Palmer Street in Kalamazoo on Sept. 14, 2003, just a few blocks from where Sugrim and his family lived.

Police also found a knife that may have been used in Gibson's murder buried in the back yard of the former Sugrim house.

In court testimony, Sugrim didn't say his wife was lying. He only said he "doesn't remember it."

There are 12 jurors and two alternates. The jury is made up of eight men and six women.

Opening statements are scheduled to begin Wednesday at 8:30 a.m.