Man Gets Life, Plus 16 Years, in Woman's Strangulation Death

An eastern Pennsylvania man has been sentenced to life in prison plus 16 years in the strangulation death of his girlfriend last year.

Twenty-six-year-old Anthony Heath of Allentown was convicted in Lehigh County last month of first-degree murder in the January 2014 death of 35-year-old Angela Steigerwalt.

The (Allentown) Morning Call reports that Judge Kelly Banach on Wednesday called him "a total smudge on the community."

Prosecutors said Heath strangled the victim with a television cord in a fit of rage because she reneged on plans to go with him to a child custody hearing, then burned her body in a neighboring county and fled to North Carolina.

Heath called the death accidental. He represented himself and rejected a plea deal calling for a 28- to 56-year prison term.