Man says he was ‘controlled by anger’ when he killed fellow Marine’s pregnant wife
A man accused of killing a U.S. Marine’s wife and dumping her body in a 140-foot mine shaft has confessed to the slaying just days before the case is to go to the jury.
Christopher Brandon Lee, 25, is charged with murder and a special circumstance of lying in wait for allegedly strangling his married lover, 19-year-old Erin Corwin, in June 2014.
For the record:
2:24 a.m. May 8, 2024A previous version of this article said that Erin Corwin had been shot to death. She was allegedly strangled.
On the stand Thursday, Lee admitted to the killing during questioning by his attorney David Kaloyanides, the attorney said. According to The Desert Sun newspaper, Lee elaborated further this week during questioning by prosecutor Sean Daugherty.
Lee claimed that he killed Corwin because he believed she had molested his daughter, the paper reported.
“I made the decision to kill her,” Lee told jurors, according to the paper. “I was controlled by the anger. The hate I felt that day, it was something I never want to experience again.”
Investigators believe Corwin and Lee, who were next-door neighbors at a military base in Twentynine Palms, were having an affair. Corwin was pregnant with Lee’s child when she was killed.
Corwin was reported missing by her husband June 28, 2014, when she did not return home from a trip to Joshua Tree National Park.
Lee was arrested in Alaska, a day after search crews found Corwin’s body in the mine shaft. Authorities had scoured the desert for weeks before finding her body.
Lee moved to Alaska with his wife and daughter after being discharged from the Marines in July 2014. He had been upset after he was rejected for deployment overseas, the Desert Sun reported.
According to an arrest warrant posted on the San Bernardino County district attorney’s website, rebar found near Corwin’s body matched rebar found in Lee’s Jeep. Lee had used rebar to strangle Corwin, the paper reported.
Closing arguments in the case began Wednesday.
For breaking California news, follow @JosephSerna on Twitter.
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