Jill Biden’s former husband has been charged in the murder of his current wife.
William Stevenson, aged 77, found himself in custody on Monday, accused of killing his wife, 64-year-old Linda Stevenson, at their Delaware residence.
Police were called to their Wilmington home on December 28, responding to what was described as a “domestic dispute.” Linda was declared dead the next day.
Details regarding the cause of Linda’s death have not been disclosed. Her obituary noted her unexpected passing but did not mention her husband.
The Stevensons shared one daughter, Christina Vettori, who has a daughter named Ciara.
Stevenson was previously married to Jill Jacobs, now known as Jill Biden, in 1970, during her college years.
The pair divorced in 1975 and two years later she married then-New Castle County Councilman Joe, the future president.Â
Stevenson later claimed that Jill had cheated on him and that he kicked her out of the house when he learned of the affair with Biden.
The ex-husband of Former First Lady Jill Biden, William Stevenson (right), was charged on Monday with the first-degree murder of his wife Linda Stevenson (left)
William, 77, was arrested for the murder of his wife in Delaware for the murder of his wifeÂ
Jill was married to William from 1970 to 1974. She then married Joe Biden in 1977
A domestic dispute was reported at the Stevensons’ home on Idlewood Road to New Castle County Police around 11.16 pm on December 29.
Police found Linda unresponsive on the living room floor when they entered the home, and , despite life-saving measures, was declared dead at the scene in the early morning hours of December 30.
Investigators were seen at the house in the Oak Hill development of Wilmington, Delaware on December 31 regarding the suspicious circumstances surrounding the domestic dispute call and the ensuing death of Linda.
Stevenson was taken into custody on Monday, charged with first-degree murder of his wife and, after failing to meet the $500,000 cash bail, was committed to the Howard Young Correctional Institution.Â
Speaking with the Daily Mail during Joe Biden’s run for president in 2020, Stevenson alleged that Jill cheated on him with the future president in August 1974 – the same year they separated.
He detailed how the two were working on then-New Castle County Councilman Joe Biden’s campaign together when he started to suspect the affair.
‘One of her best friends told me she thought Joe and Jill were getting a little too close. I was surprised that she came to me,’ he told the Daily Mail.
Stevenson said his suspicions were confirmed after a man told him Joe had been driving his wife’s car when they were involved in an accident together.
Bill is pictured with Jill Biden in the 1970s. The couple married in 1970, when Jill was still in college, and divorced in 1975Â
Bill and Linda Stevenson pictured with their daughter Christina Vettori (left)
‘I asked Jill to leave the house, which she did,’ he said. ‘Her father was begging me to take her back when he found out what was going on. He asked me to give her a second chance, but I wasn’t interested.’Â
Representatives for Jill told Inside Edition in 2020 that the affair claims were ‘fictitious’ to ‘sell and promote a book’ that Bill was preparing to release.
‘The relationship of Joe and Jill Biden is well documented,’ the spokesman said.
‘Jill Biden separated from her first husband irreconcilably in the fall of 1974 and moved out of their marital home. Joe and Jill Biden had their first date in March of 1975, and they married in June of 1977.’
In her 2019 memoir, When the Light Enters: Building a Family, Discovering Myself, Jill admitted she first thought she and Stevenson were ‘destined for each other.’
‘Looking back, it may seem like a mistake of youth,’ she scathingly wrote about the man she indirectly referred to as ‘charming and entrepreneurial’ in the book.
Jill’s biographer detailed how the former first lady was disillusioned by the relationship and had to ‘compartmentalize’ her first marriage in order to move on.
‘She had these expectations of sort of what that marriage was going to be, and the marriage did not live up to those expectations,’ Julie Pace told People Magazine in 2022.
‘She was incredibly young and probably a bit naive about what life was going to look like, and it stings her. It really stings her, and it makes her question quite a bit,’ she added.
