Chiavetta hearing focuses on alleged confession

CEDAR RAPIDS, IA - Questioning during a hearing in Linn County District Court this morning focused on an alleged confession made by Kimberly Chiavetta while she was hospitalized after a suicide attempt.

Chiavetta, 37, of 95 Front St. in Robins, was charged with first-degree murder and administering harmful substances after her husband Frank Chiavetta, 60, died on July 11 from insulin shock.

Kimberly Chiavetta was hospitalized on July 12 after an apparent prescription drug overdose.

Cedar Rapids Police Detective Douglas Larison testified this morning that while hospitalized on July 14, Chiavetta first told Robins Police Detective Carol Currans what she did to cause her husband's death.

Larison said he had stepped out of Chiavetta's hospital room after she said, "I'm done talking. I want a lawyer."

When Larison returned to her hospital room, Chiavetta repeated what she had told Currans then told police where to find insulin bottles and syringes hidden in a hole in the wall of her daughter's bedroom.

When asked if she had changed her mind about wanting a lawyer, Chiavetta indicated she had, Larison said.

She is accused of injecting  her husband with four times the lethal dose of insulin. Court records show Frank Chiavetta was not diabetic.

She is being held in the Linn County Jail on $500,000 bond. A jury trial is set for July 11.