The body of the 50-year-old woman was found in a peat bog near Katzen Lake, north of Zurich, on May 1st 2010.

The judges were unable to establish how the man exactly killed his spouse but they had no doubt as to his culpability thanks to a “mosaic of evidence,” according to the ruling.

The defendant has always denied his guilt.

But investigators rapidly discarded the thesis of suicide or an accident in his wife’s death, the SDA news agency reported.

By the end of 2010 all the evidence collected pointed to the husband having murdered her.

The body of the woman was found weighed down with two cement blocks and a car driveshaft that were previously stored in the accused man’s home, SDA reported.

Other evidence before the court included an SMS that the man sent to his mistress in Bosnia.

Shortly before disappearing, the victim telephoned her uncle and talked to him of a violent dispute that she had had with her husband.

A divorce had been mentioned, the uncle testified.

The defendant’s lawyer argued for an acquittal because of the lack of evidence, SDA said.

He noted that the cement blocks and driveshaft were kept in the garden of the accused and anyone could have taken them.

But the prosecutor argued that the man killed his wife out of greed, fearing the financial consequences of a divorce.

“The court has no doubt about the fact that the accused killed his wife,” the chief judge said.