Attorneys will often be able to predict the verdict in a case based on the amount of time it takes a jury to deliberate. But as the second trial of Carol Hignite ended, this panels members had the lead prosecutor guessing.We got a question around 3 p.m. that made us think they're almost done, then we didn't hear anything else. Then we got another question around 8 oclock thinking we're not getting a verdict. Then we thought we're going to have to try this case a 3rd time, Katie Schafer from the Commonwealths Attorneys office explained.But after eight years, two trials (the first resulted in a hung jury), and 12 hours of jury discussions, Carol Ann Hignite has been found guilty in the 2017 death of her husband, Leon. It was after midnight Friday when the jury returned from deliberations to deliver the guilty verdict, with a sentencing recommendation of 11 years (ten for the manslaughter charge, and one for the charge of wanton neglect).I was relieved, said Schafer who also prosecuted the first case in 2022.I think we had a juror in that first trial who was very clear she did not want to consider the Commonwealth's evidence, Schafer said of the juror who has openly befriended Hignite since she was released following the result of the first trial. She has maintained to this day she did not want to consider the Commonwealths evidence, she continued.Schafer said her team had to do some things differently during this trial. Unlike in 2022 they werent allowed to bring the jurors to the Hignites home to show them the bathroom where Carol said her husband sustained all his fatal injuries after a fall. They used pictures this time, and a lot of recordings from the interrogation room where detectives initially questioned Carol in 2017. Both of those made Hignites account of what happened seem flimsy at best.The most compelling part of that interrogation was she had a lot of changing stories, Schafer said.She also alluded to another tactic that likely helped persuade jurors.This time we talked more about the previous acts of abuse against her husband, and ultimately that was helpful to see what the dynamic was of their relationship, and the ongoing abuse he was suffering at the hands of his wife, Schafer detailed.It was apparently a pattern of abuse that made it easy for the Hignite children to celebrate the verdict, even as justice was served at the expense of their own mother.When it happened, they knew it wasn't an accident, Schafer stated. Although they had a lot of complicated emotions about the fact their mother did murder their father they didn't have a lot of sympathy towards their mother. Jason Hignite said he didn't want their mother to see the light of day and that she ruined their lives, and they were very upset about the loss of their father, she continued.She might not see the light of day as Jason said. Carol is 76 years old and in failing health. Schafer said defense counsel will likely file an appeal, but time isnt on Hignites side.Its hard for the jury to sentence a woman who's almost 80 to prison, because it could be a death sentence, Schafer said when asked about some of the challenges she faced during trial this time around.