Man sentenced to life without parole for murdering ex days after getting out of prison

By Madeline Bartos

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    PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — A Cambria County man will spend the rest of his life in prison after prosecutors said he killed his ex-girlfriend days after he was released from jail for assaulting her.

Fifty-year-old Christopher Rowe was sentenced to life without parole after he was convicted of first-degree murder and other charges for strangling Kaylene Roedel, Pennsylvania Attorney General Michelle Henry announced on Thursday.

In 2016, the attorney general’s office said Rowe was in jail for assaulting Roedel. According to testimony during his trial in November of last year, he told other inmates that he wanted to kill her. After he was released, prosecutors said Rowe showed up at her workplace and threatened her.

She went missing days later and was found dead on Aug. 7, 2016, on a hiking trail in Johnstown. Prosecutors said Roedel’s vehicle was seen driving near the location where her body was found, and Rowe was in possession of the car.

A witness also told police that Rowe admitted to strangling his ex-girlfriend and threatened to kill the witness if they said anything, the attorney general’s office said.

“This defendant ended one life and devastated many others with the premeditated and cold-hearted killing of the mother of his child,” Henry said in a press release. “We hope this first-degree murder conviction and life sentence — which ensures he will never harm another person in free society — provide a sense of justice for Kaylene’s family and friends.”

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