Ex-Sailor Found Guilty of Murder
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DETROIT — A former Navy sailor was found guilty Thursday of first-degree murder in the first of what could be six trials in the deaths of Detroit-area prostitutes.
John E. Armstrong, 27, showed no emotion as the verdict was read. He will be sentenced April 3 to life in prison without parole.
Armstrong told police he found Wendy Jordan’s half-naked body in the icy Rouge River on Jan. 2, 2000. She had been strangled.
Judy Jordan, the slain woman’s sister, said she wanted Armstrong to go to jail so he can “sit there and think about it every day because we have to think about it every day.”
Armstrong also is charged in the murders of five other area prostitutes. Police say Armstrong admitted killing at least 11 more prostitutes at ports worldwide while in the Navy from 1993 to 1998: three in the Seattle area, two in Hawaii, two in Hong Kong and one each in North Carolina, Virginia, Thailand and Singapore.
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