MEMPHIS, Tenn. – A woman was convicted Thursday of murdering her husband, whose body was found in a storage bin at their Parkway Village home back in 2016.
According to Shelby County Dist. Atty. Gen. Amy Weirich, the Criminal Court jury took only 17 minutes to convict Latosha Starks-Twilley, 43, of first degree murder for the death of her husband, Waddell Twilley.
Waddell Twilley was reported missing from his home on Cottonwood on June 18, 2016.
His body was found when the couple’s 11-year-old son called his father’s cellphone and heard it ring from inside an upstairs wall, but no one picked it up, authorities said. The boy had a neighbor notify police.
That neighbor is Lular Carruth. She says the boy ran to her home next door crying.
“I said, what’s wrong?” Carruth said. “He said I think my mama done killed my daddy.”
When police arrived, they heard the cellphone ringing inside an attic crawl space, behind a padlocked door inside a closet. They obtained a key from Twilley.
Inside the crawl space, authorities said they found a large plastic tub with the victim’s body encased in concrete and covered with clothes, dirt, cigarette butts and other debris.
“The victim’s hands and feet were handcuffed, and his head was wrapped in several layers of plastic and duct tape. The cause of death was suffocation,” Weirich’s office wrote.
“He was such a good person to me. He was always friendly,” Carruth said. “I hate it for the kids because the kids they just love they daddy. They love they daddy.”
Starks-Twilley told police she saw her husband alive early that morning but could not explain where he was between when she saw him alive and when police found him dead. She claimed a large hole she was digging in the backyard was for a garden.
Starks-Twilley has a criminal record with previous arrests for aggravated assault, attempted second-degree murder and aggravated statutory rape. She was convicted on the rape charge in 2006 and placed on the sex offender registry.
She faces a life sentence in prison.
Three children who were in the house were placed with a family member, police said.
