Christine Demeter (1940 – July 18, 1973) was murdered in the garage of her home in

Mississauga Mississauga ( ), historically known as Toronto Township, is a city in the Canadian province of Ontario. It is situated on the shores of Lake Ontario in the Regional Municipality of Peel, adjoining the western border of Toronto. With a popul ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

, Canada, at the age of 33. The case attracted much attention in Canada because Demeter, a model, was young and beautiful, and her murder had been mysterious. The case was investigated by Detective William Teggart (who would later rise to police chief) of the

Peel Regional Police The Peel Regional Police (PRP) provide policing services for Peel Regional Municipality, Ontario, Peel Region (excluding Caledon) in Ontario, Canada. It is the second largest municipal police service in Ontario after the Toronto Police Service an ...

. Demeter's husband,

Peter Demeter Peter Demeter (born 19 April 1933) is a Hungarian-born Canadian former real estate developer convicted in 1974 of arranging the murder of his wife. It was the longest trial in Canadian history and revealed that both husband and wife may have been ...

, was subsequently convicted of hiring a killer to murder her to cash in on a million-dollar insurance policy. He was sentenced to life imprisonment. As of May 31, 2010, Peter Demeter (now 77 years old) is still in prison in Ontario.

George Jonas George Jonas, CM (June 15, 1935 – January 10, 2016) was a Hungarian-born Canadian writer, poet, and journalist. A self-described classical liberal, he authored 16 books, including the bestseller '' Vengeance'' (1984), the story of an Israeli ...

and his then-wife Barbara Amiel, published a book about the case, ''By Persons Unknown: The Strange Death of Christine Demeter'' (1976). The Demeter case served as the basis for the fictional 1978 film ''

I Miss You, Hugs and Kisses ''I Miss You, Hugs and Kisses'' (also known as ''Drop Dead, Dearest'' and ''Left for Dead'') is a 1978 Canadian drama mystery film based on the Peter Demeter murder case. The film is one of the infamous "Video Nasties Video nasty is a colloqui ...

'', directed by Murray Markowitz. The victim is renamed Magdalene Kruschen and is played by German actress

Elke Sommer Elke Sommer (; born Elke Baronin von Schletz, 5 November 1940) is a German actress. She appeared in numerous films in her heyday throughout the 1960s and 1970s, including roles in ''The Pink Panther (1963 film), The Pink Panther'' sequel ''A S ...

References

"Wife-killer loses DNA legal battle"
''The Whig-Standard'', 30 May 2006. 1940 births 1973 deaths Canadian murder victims Female murder victims People murdered in Ontario {{Canada-model-stub