NE Philly man pleads guilty to strangling wife in Pennypack Park

SHAKING AND sobbing, a Northeast Philly man apologized for strangling his wife in Pennypack Park last year.

Christopher Murray, 49, his hands trembling while holding a handwritten statement, turned around and stood facing the courtroom gallery filled with his and his wife's family members.

"I accept full responsibility for my actions on that night and the days following, and I never meant for that to happen," he said of the strangulation of his wife, Connie Murray, 46. "She was my first and only true love," he said.

Sniffles and sobs were also heard in the packed courtroom, where the elder of the couple's two daughters, Emily, 16, sat with other family members.

"Emily, I love you," the father told his daughter, who appeared red-faced with emotion.

Murray, now bald and wearing glasses, pleaded guilty yesterday as part of a negotiated plea deal to third-degree murder and was sentenced to 20 to 40 years in prison, the maximum sentence on that charge.

By pleading guilty, he avoided a trial and a possible conviction on a first-degree-murder charge, which would have carried a sentence of life in prison.

Assistant District Attorney Joanne Pescatore told Common Pleas Judge Benjamin Lerner that the victim's family members "were fine" with the plea deal because they want to move on.

It was on the night of Aug. 4, that Murray followed his wife to Pennypack Park after the two argued, and she left the house to go for a walk, Pescatore said. In the park, he strangled her, then falsely reported her missing to the police and pretended to look for her, Pescatore said.

"This case is really hard," said Pescatore, teary-eyed, her voice cracking. She told the judge the Murrays' two daughters, Emily and Elizabeth, 12, "for lack of a better word are two orphans."

The girls are now living with a paternal uncle, Francis Murray.

According to a statement that Christopher Murray gave homicide detectives days after strangling his wife, he said he and his wife were arguing in the park, on a bench near Holme and Convent avenues, over his sending text messages to another woman.

He claimed his wife slapped him. "I was holding her arms, then at that point, I just snapped," he said of his wife, who was born with her right arm ending at the elbow.

Asked by detectives if he choked her, the husband said: "Yes, I guess I must have. I don't remember doing it."

But Pescatore discredited parts of Murray's statement. Murray only admitted strangling his wife after he sent cops "on a wild-goose chase," she said.

It wasn't until after homicide detectives "pored over hours of video" and Murray failed a lie-detector test that he fessed up, Pescatore said.

The prosecutor said it was unbelievable that Murray could not recall strangling his wife.

"You absolutely have your hands on their throat," she said. "You can feel the life going out of them."

Pescatore credited homicide detectives Howard Peterman, Gregory Santamala and James Dunlap, a video expert, for their relentless investigation in the case.

Roger Schrading, one of two public defenders who represented Murray, read a statement in court that said in part: "Mere words cannot express the depth of sorrow and remorse that Christopher Murray feels for the loss of life caused by his actions."

He said Murray "is a man who should not be judged by the worst thing he has ever done."

Murray, a lifelong Philadelphian who graduated from Father Judge High School in Holmesburg, served four years in active duty with the Navy, mostly at a submarine base in Connecticut, then worked as a machinist, Schrading said. The attorney said Murray married Connie, his high-school sweetheart, in 1996.

Connie Murray's younger brother, Kevin McClain, and her friend Elizabeth Hale both told the judge how the victim was a loving mom, a steadfast friend and a talkative, humorous person.

"You will always be in our hearts," her brother said of his sister, one of his six siblings.