SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA / A news summary : The Local Review / DEVELOPMENTS IN LOS ANGELES COUNTY : Woman Sentenced in Killing of Roommate
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SANTA MONICA — A young woman was sentenced to 26 years to life in prison Tuesday for drowning her roommate in a bathtub and throwing the body into a trash dumpster.
Amber Lee Williams, 24, expressed no remorse when she addressed Superior Court Judge Leslie W. Light before he imposed the maximum sentence, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Renee Meckler. A jury convicted Williams of first-degree murder in the slaying of Nilda Raquel Arrabal.
Williams, a transient, killed Arrabal in February 1998 while Williams was staying in the victim’s newly acquired apartment, Meckler said. Arrabal apparently became angry when Williams brought home a man identified only as “Ricky.”
When Arrabal ordered Williams out of the apartment, Williams attacked her with a hot iron, Meckler said. “Ricky” and Williams dragged Arrabal to the bathtub and drowned her before wrapping the body in a futon cover and tossing it in the dumpster.
Though Arrabal’s body and “Ricky” were never found, Meckler used DNA evidence to show that Arrabal’s blood was found in the apartment, said district attorney’s spokeswoman Sandi Gibbons.
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