Carol Jean Pierce, in an undated photo (Photo: Sturgeon Bay Police Department) 
 
 An 82-year-old Michigan man has been arrested on murder charges in the 1975 disappearance of his wife from Sturgeon Bay. 
 
 According to a new criminal complaint, Richard Gale Pierce, of Cheboygan, was the last person who saw his wife, Carol Jean Pierce, 35, in September 1975. The complaint says he "had motive and opportunity to end her life, and benefitted from her demise in numerous ways." 
 
 While the 19-page complaint details Carol Jean's prior marriages, her time with Pierce as he served in the U.S. Coast Guard, others' impressions of their relationship, and their plans to move to Cheboygan upon his retirement, it cites no new evidence in the case, but the accretion of years of sometimes inconsistent statements by Pierce to others about Carol Jean's disappearance. 
 
 Richard Gale Pierce (Photo: Wisconsin Department of Justice) 
 
 Carol Jean's remains were never found, and no activity was ever found associated with her accounts or Social Security number. She and Pierce were legally divorced in 1977. 
 
 Though Pierce was clearly a suspect for decades, the last investigative efforts in the case appeared to have been in 2010, according to the complaint, until the Wisconsin Cold Case Review Team of the Wisconsin Association of Homicide Investigators discussed it last month. 
 
 The arrest was announced Thursday by the Department of Justice and Sturgeon Bay Police, which were assisted by authorities in Michigan 
 
 “With no answers as to ‘why’ for years, perhaps some ‘answers’ will begin to be offered to the Fillion family members," Sturgeon Bay Police Chief Arleigh Porter said of Carol Jean's family. 
 
 "While the pursuit of justice is often difficult, and in this case long overdue, investigators never gave up and hope to bring to light answers to family members on Carol Jean’s behalf.” 
 
 According to the complaint: 
 
 Pierce told fellow Coast Guard members that on Sept. 8, 1975, he returned to the couple's trailer and found evidence his wife had left him and taken their savings. He only reported her missing 82 days later. He told police that she had left before and returned after a couple days. 
 
 The couple had married in 1966. It was her third marriage and his second. In 1973, he was assigned to the Coast Guard cutter Mesquite, stationed in Sturgeon Bay. 
 
 People who knew the couple later told investigators they seemed to argue a lot, that Carol Jean was "the suspicious type" and often the aggressor in arguments. Others recalled Carol Jean appearing beaten and physically abused. At least one former neighbor told investigators Carol Jean said she thought her husband was going to kill her. 
 
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 But in letters to her mother in the months before she disappeared, Carol Jean seemed upbeat about her husband's impending retirement and their planned move to Cheboygan. She was even trying to save $100 to buy him a Coast Guard ring as a surprise retirement gift. 
 
 She told her mother the couple had taken out a prepaid $25,000 life insurance policy; it was never collected. 
 
 Neighbors also recalled Carol Jean's excitement about the move and said she would never have walked out on her husband as he claimed. 
 
 But Pierce's shipmates got a different impression about his view of the marriage. One recalled Pierce commenting favorably when the ship captain's wife died from a fall down their basement steps. 
 
 Several people told investigators Pierce didn't seem very upset that his wife left him. He even invited her mother to his retirement party a couple weeks later, telling her he assumed Carol Jean was staying with her. 
 
 Pierce moved to Michigan that same month, met a woman at a bar the next month and married her in 1978. She is now deceased. 
 
 Her grandson told investigators in 2005 that one time after his grandmother gave instructions to Pierce about the placement of furniture, directions Pierce disagreed with, Pierce commented to him, "That's why I got rid of my wife." 
 
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 MADISON, Wis. -- Prosecutors charged a Michigan man Thursday with killing his wife 43 years ago in Wisconsin based largely on witnesses saying he seemed unhappy in their marriage, her comments to neighbors that she thought he was going to kill her and other discrepancies in his story. 
 
 Law enforcement agents from Wisconsin and Michigan arrested Richard Gale Pierce, 82, Thursday in his hometown of Cheboygan, Michigan. He faces one count of first-degree murder and one count of disinterment of the dead in connection with the death of his wife Carol Jean Pierce. 
 
 He is being held at Cheboygan County Jail pending his return to Wisconsin. It's unclear if Pierce has an attorney to speak on his behalf. 
 
 Carol Jean Pierce was 35 when she disappeared from the couple's trailer home in Sturgeon Bay in September 1975. Her body has never been found. 
 
 Richard Pierce previously claimed that she walked out on him. But cold case detectives with the Wisconsin Association of Homicide Investigators allege in a criminal complaint that Pierce had the opportunity and motivation to kill her. 
 
 The 20-page complaint offers mostly circumstantial evidence, recounting witness interviews collected over four decades that paint a picture of an abusive marriage. 
 
 According to the complaint, the couple got married in September 1966. Pierce was a sailor in the U.S. Coast Guard at the time, assigned to the cutter Mesquite. The ship was based in Sturgeon Bay when Carol Jean disappeared. 
 
 Acquaintances told detectives the couple argued often. A woman who lived next door to the couple when they were stationed in New Jersey told investigators that Carol Jean had told her Pierce had beat her the night before and her face was badly bruised. 
 
 Another neighbor reported that Carol Jean told her at least three times she thought Pierce was going to kill her and she wanted to go somewhere no one would find her. 
 
 Pierce's former shipmates told authorities that Carol Jean didn't trust Pierce and she had a personality that would probably "drive a guy like Pierce nuts." One shipmate recalled how the ship captain's wife had died from a fall down stairs and how Pierce had commented "that was a pretty good deal. (The captain) got rid of his wife." 
 
 According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, one witness told investigators that when Pierce disagreed with being told how to position furniture, Pierce commented: "That's why I got rid of my wife." 
 
 After Carol Jean disappeared, a neighbor visited the couple's trailer home to see how Pierce was doing. She noticed Carol Jean's purse on the kitchen counter and her entire record collection, as well as her cat and make-up, were still in the home. 
 
 The complaint said that Pierce told then-Sturgeon Bay Police Chief Michael Nordin in 1982 that Carol Jean had made off with $1,000 cash that Pierce had hidden in a standard-size envelope - even though $1,000 wouldn't have fit in such an envelope, the chief wrote. 
 
 Pierce also claimed during that interview that he had used the Sturgeon Bay phone book to call Green Bay hospitals looking for Carol Jean. The phone book didn't list any Green Bay hospitals, the chief noted. 
 
 The cold case detectives conclude that Carol Jean's death meant a number of gains for Pierce, including a pension unencumbered by marriage, most of the couple's important belongings, sole possession of the couple's retirement land in Michigan and a new girlfriend.
– Richard Gale Pierce said he arrived home on Sept. 8, 1975, to the trailer he shared with his wife in Sturgeon Bay, Wis., and found that she had left him. Eighty-two days passed before he reported Carol Jean Pierce, 35, missing, telling police that she had left before and returned after a few days. Long a suspect in his wife's disappearance, Gale, now 82, was arrested Thursday and charged with murdering her, the Journal Sentinel reports. According to a criminal complaint, Richard Pierce "had motive and opportunity to end her life, and benefitted from her demise in numerous ways," including "a pension unencumbered by a wife, most of the important belongings from their marriage, land and a home in Michigan, a new girlfriend weeks after Carol Jean's disappearance, as well as the benefit of Carol Jean's silence." "This is a day I've wanted to see for a long time," Carol Jean Pierce's brother, Brian Fillion, tells the Green Bay Press Gazette. Richard Pierce was being held in jail in Cheboygan, Mich., his hometown, pending extradition to Wisconsin, CBS reports. The criminal complaint contains mainly circumstantial evidence against him, such as a statement from a neighbor who says Carol Jean Pierce was worried that her husband would kill her, statements from acquaintances that the couple argued a lot, and alleged instances of physical abuse. A cold case review team in Wisconsin took a look at the case last month and decided to pursue it, according to reports. On Thursday, police in Sturgeon Bay were searching the property where the Pierces lived when Carol Jean Pierce disappeared, per the Green Bay Press Gazette.