Connecticut mom-of-5 Jennifer Dulos declared dead 4 years after disappearance: ‘Inescapable conclusion’

Jennifer Dulos, the mother-of-five who disappeared from her Connecticut home over four years ago, has been officially declared dead — days before her husband’s ex-girlfriend is set to stand trial in connection to the vanishing.

Dorien-New Caanan Probate Judge William P. Osterndorf made the declaration in a court decision on Oct. 24, 2023, according to multiple reports.

“Extensive efforts have been made by local and State Police authorities to locate her body,” Osterndorf wrote in his decision, according to the CT Insider. “To date, more than four years have passed and the body of Jennifer has not been located.”

Dulos was last seen dropping her kids off at New Canaan Country School on May 24, 2019.

She was supposed to meet her children at her mother’s home in NYC later in the day, but never showed up.

A missing person’s report for Dulos was issued to the New Caanan police just before 6:59 p.m. that Friday, to her home where they located “suspected blood evidence” in a Range Rover parked inside one of the home’s garages.

“The over-whelming evidence submitted to the Court supports the claim that Jennifer sustained non-survivable injuries,” the decision states, according to NBC Connecticut.

“The inescapable conclusion is Jennifer is deceased,” Osterndorf concluded.

Dulos’ mother Gloria Farber, 88, had petitioned the court for a declaration of death in case she died before her daughter was legally declared dead by the state.

In Connecticut, a person can be presumed dead after being missing and unheard of for seven or more years.

At the time of her disappearance, Dulos was in a nasty divorce and custody battle with her estranged husband Fotis Dulos, who was arrested in connection to her disappearance on Jan. 7, 2020.

Fotis Doulos was charged with capital murder, murder and kidnapping.

He was caught on video dumping black plastic garbage bags, which contained four 3-foot-long zip ties stained with Jennifer’s blood and her clothes, across Hartford. Conn. the night of his wife’s disappearance.

“It appears the Zip Ties were used to secure and incapacitate Jennifer Dulos for some time period, during which her blood transferred onto the ties,” court documents stated in 2020.

“It is reasonable that Jennifer Dulos was alive at the time the Zip Ties were attached to restrain her movements and prevent her escape.”

Fotis Dulos died in a Bronx hospital on Jan. 30, days after he attempted to commit suicide while out of jail on a $6 million bail, and a day before he was scheduled to attend another bail hearing.

He proclaimed that he was innocent and had not killed Dulos in his suicide note left at his Farmington, Conn. home.

The petition for a declaration of death was to ensure there was no disruption of the disposition of Dulos’ estate, to whom she had left all her assets to her children in her will signed in April 2017, just two months before she filed for divorce.

“As long as Jennifer’s status was undecided, then the children could not inherit from her or from her mother,” Farber’s lawyer, Richard Weinstein said, according to CT Insider. “We were concerned, obviously, with Mrs. Farber being 88 years of age, needing to wait the seven years.”

Farber has been caring for her grandchildren, who are now between the ages of 13 and 17, since her daughter’s disappearance.

Dulos’ death declaration was announced ahead of a trial for Fotis Dulos’ ex-girlfriend, Michelle Troconis, who was arrested on the same day as Fotis Dulos.

Troconis faces charges of conspiracy to commit murder and tampering with evidence, among others.

She has pleaded not guilty to all charges, and her trial was scheduled to begin on Monday, but jury issues pushed the start date to Jan. 11, according the Hartford Courant.