Man chokes roommate to death before dismembering her with ax

An Arizona man was sentenced to more than three decades in prison after being convicted of choking his ex-roommate to death and using an ax to dismember her remains.

Timothy Sullivan, 66, received 31 years and six months behind bars for the murder of Amy “Ruby” Leagans, 49, in 2020. He pleaded guilty to charges of second-degree murder and concealing a body in September.

Leagans family reported her missing On October 27, 2020. Before the woman’s death, Sullivan had been on probation for aggravated assault. He later confessed the killing to police and blamed it on a traumatic brain injury.

He explained how he “snapped” and choked the victim to death after she yelled at him in her apartment. He kept her body there for two days before burying her remains in the backyard.

“He then became worried and exhumed her body. He then dismembered her body,” investigators wrote in court documents, according to Law & Crime. He then put her limbs in trash receptacles around the Phoenix area.

Officers found part of the woman’s remains on November 17, 2020 in Phoenix’s Salt River. Her torso was discovered in the desert. Sullivan was arrested three days later.

“The body was that of a nearly skeletonized female that was inside a black plastic bag and covered with mulch. The body showed signs of trauma and was dismembered,” officials wrote in court documents obtained by KSAZ, a Fox affiliate.

In court, her family told another outlet, KPNX, how Sullivan mutilated Leagans the way a butcher would a cow.

The victim’s sister told the judge: “He deemed her trash to be dumped in the Arizona desert. What that man did to my sister, what he did on this judicial system, his manipulations, his lies, is excruciating.”

“I take full responsibility for my actions,” Sullivan said, according to local news reports.