| For Immediate Release Case # 05NF2705
May 9, 2008 |
Susan Kang Schroeder Public Affairs Counsel Office: 714-347-8408 Cell: 714-292-2718 Farrah Emami |
MAN SENTENCED TO LIFE WITHOUT PAROLE FOR TORTURING AND MURDERING LIVE-IN GIRLFRIEND
BY CUTTING OUT HER TONGUE
SANTA ANA – A La Palma man was sentenced today to life without the possibility of parole for murdering his live-in girlfriend, Patricia Dunthorne, after torturing her by cutting off her tongue. Frank Robert Mallory, 50, was found guilty February 14, 2008 of murder with a sentencing enhancement for murder with torture.
Between June 25, 2005 and July 15, 2005, Mallory tortured and murdered his girlfriend by cutting off her tongue and leaving her to bleed to death on the bed after becoming suspicious that she may have been seeing another man. He hid her dead body in his garage under a blanket and left her there for weeks. The defendant told neighbors that his girlfriend had gone on a trip to Utah and changed the outgoing voicemail message on her phone saying the same.
On July 16, 2005, police officers received a call from Mallory’s brother reporting the dead body. The brother had gone to the defendant’s house to walk the dog and discovered Dunthorne’s body after noticing an odor coming from the garage.
Senior Deputy District Attorney Larry Yellin of the Homicide Unit prosecuted this case.
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