A Florida man killed his wife after she was dismissive of his plans to participate in a house-flipping reality TV show that he believed would save them from the money pit their home had become, prosecutors said.

The murder trial of David Tronnes, 55, began this week in Orlando with opening statements from prosecutors; defense attorneys chose to defer their statement until later in the trial. Tronnes has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder in the 2018 death of his wife, 39-year-old Shanti Cooper-Tronnes, whom hed been married to for about a year.

According to prosecutors, Tronnes initially told investigators that his wife had passed out and fallen in the bathtub on April 24, 2018 one week after she walked out of a meeting with a contractor who worked for the reality show Zombie House Flipping, a lifeline Tronnes was counting on to save the home, prosecutor Michael Smith said.

First responders questioned Tronnes account from the start, Smith said, saying that they immediately saw that Cooper-Tronnes had been the victim of a violent attack and had multiple injuries, including a huge wound on her face and bruising around her neck. A medical examiner determined she had died from blunt force trauma to her head and strangulation.