Man gets 20yrs for strangling woman

In 2003 he was jailed for striking a woman with a car "club lock". Now, Wayne Edward Jones has been sentenced for murdering a woman in a NSW motel room.

A man who stuffed himself with pizza while the body of the woman he bashed and strangled lay nearby, will serve at least 20 years for murder.

Wayne Edward Jones, 43, was in "some sort of drug-fuelled rage" when he killed 34-year-old Michelle Reynolds in December 2012.

In sentencing him, Justice Richard Button said Ms Reynolds was last seen when the pair checked into a motel room near Coffs Harbour on the NSW north coast at around 7pm on December 12.

Sometime between then and December 15, Justice Button said Jones - while high on the drug "ice" - bashed Ms Reynolds, burnt her with a corrosive chemical and then strangled her.

The 34-year-old woman was then "hog-tied" - her arms and ankles bound behind her.

As her battered body lay just metres away, Jones ate a large amount of takeaway pizza in the motel room.

"The ghastliness of that image requires no elaboration by me," Justice Button said.

Following her death, the court heard Jones organised for a Coffs Harbour taxi driver to pick him up from the motel and put some "luggage" in the cab boot.

As the cab driver stopped for a cigarette during the trip, Jones surreptitiously removed Ms Reynolds body and dragged her into bushland.

Her body was dumped, Justice Button said "in the same way that some citizens dump their unwanted household refuse".

The court heard Jones had battled drug addiction for three decades and had been in and out of jail as a result.

In 2003 he was sentenced to at least four and a half years after he struck a woman with a motor vehicle "club lock", collapsing the left side of her face.

"Regrettably, the previous act of brutal violence inflicted upon a defenceless woman ... was unable to deflect the offender from progressing to the worst crime known to law," Justice Button said.

He sentenced him to a minimum of 20 and a maximum of 27 years for the murder.

He was also sentenced to a fixed term of 18 months for supplying a prohibited drug.

Taken into account time already served, Jones will be eligible for release in September 2033.


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