THE CHILLING MURDER OF THE PETIT FAMILY: The Cheshire Murders

On July 23, 2007, Steven Hayes and Joshua Komisarjevsky invaded the Cheshire, Connecticut, residence of the Petit family. They initially planned to rob Jennifer Hawke-Petit and her two daughters, Hayley, 17, and Michaela, 11, while they were in the house. Dr. William Petit, their father, escaped with severe injuries.

As reported by the Hartford Courant, the case received significant publicity in Connecticut, possibly the state's most widely publicized crime. Connecticut's death penalty was significantly delayed as a result of the murders, which received national and international attention.

A death sentence was handed down to Hayes in 2010 for the murders he committed. When Komisarjevsky was convicted in 2011, he was sentenced to death in 2012. In August 2015, when the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled the death penalty unconstitutional, all death sentences were commuted to life imprisonment, even if they had been convicted before the death penalty was abolished.