SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. – A former Marine who confessed to strangling a 19-year-old woman and tossing her body into a California desert mine shaft has been convicted of first-degree murder.
Twenty-seven-year-old Christopher Brandon Lee was convicted Thursday in San Bernardino. He's facing life in prison without chance of parole.
Lee pleaded not guilty to killing Erin Corwin, the wife of another Marine, in June of 2014.
EX-MARINE ADMITS IN COURT TO KILLING OTHER MARINE'S WIFE
But a few days ago at trial, Lee said he strangled Corwin in a fit of anger and threw the body down a 140-foot-deep abandoned mineshaft near Joshua Tree National Park.
Friends told investigators that Corwin believed she was pregnant and Lee might be the father. Authorities say Lee wanted to hide the affair.
Lee testified that he was angry because he suspected Corwin had molested his daughter.
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