A Fair Grove woman who was accused of putting Visine in her husbands iced-tea in an attempt to kill him will not be going to trial on the charge.Tonia Peterson's defense attorney, Stacy Bilyeu, told Associate Circuit Court Judge Dan Imhof that the state did not produce any evidence, other than hearsay, that her client intended to harm her husband.
While on the stand during his wife's preliminary hearing yesterday Cecil Peterson said that he did not suspect that his wife was trying to poison him, and that he had never seen Visine in the couples home.
Bileyu told the judge that that the state did not even have an expert on hand to testify that Visine could cause the diarrhea or swelling in Cecil Peterson's leg and arm that they contend came from Tonia Peterson spiking her husbands tea with the over the counter eye remedy in mid-2008.
Bileyu told Juge Imhof that stress from the marriage, or the possibility that Tonia Peterson could have been a really bad cook should be considered to have given her husband the same symptoms.
A co-worker of Tonia Peterson contacted the Greene County Sheriffs Office and told them that the woman told her about the plot to kill her husband in January of this year.
Imhof did allow prosecutors to show an interrogation video of Peterson, then called for a recess to review case law.
In the video Peterson told Weatherford that Cecil Peterson was going to divorce her and had threatened to take the couple's eight year-old son with him.
After reviewing case law, Imhof said that he believed that the state was missing a witness and dismissed the case.
Myers has given the sheriff's office the green light to continue the investigation, but says that it is too soon to determine whether he will re-file charges against Tonia Peterson.
Tonia Peterson filed for divorce from her husband shortly after being charged with first degree assault in January of this year.
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