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Maxwell man gets 20-60 years in prison for killing wife

Emerson Craig
Emerson Craig

NORTH PLATTE, Neb. (AP) — A man has been given 20 to 60 years in prison for killing his wife on their farm in western Nebraska.

The Nebraska attorney general’s office said 62-year-old Emerson Craig was sentenced Monday in Lincoln County District Court in North Platte. He’d pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in the April 26, 2014, slaying of 52-year-old Heidi Craig.

Emerson Craig had called authorities to the farm near Maxwell and said his wife had been crushed under a hay bale, which he said he had moved using a truck. Officials say autopsy results showed she had actually died of blunt force trauma to the head and strangulation.

Investigators say Craig had obtained a life insurance policy on his wife that would pay double if her death were a result of an accident.

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