Indiana man gets 50 years in wife's 2020 killing, beheading

CRAWFORDSVILLE, Ind. (AP) - A west central Indiana man was sentenced to 50 years in prison after pleading guilty to killing his wife, whose severed head was found buried in the basement of the couple's home.

A Montgomery County judge sentenced Michael D. Parks, 46, on Friday after accepting his guilty plea to one count of murder in Hope Parks' August 2020 fatal shooting. The Crawfordsville man had been scheduled to stand trial Monday.

Parks was sentenced to the 50-year sentence called for under his plea agreement, with no time suspended. He will not be eligible for parole, the (Crawfordsville) Journal Review reported.

Hope Parks' headless body was found on Aug. 20, 2020, on a bridge as Parks was reporting her missing to Crawfordsville police. He told officers he had not seen her since she had left the house two days earlier after an argument and left in a vehicle driven by an unknown person.

But after officers found dried blood during a search of the couple's home and property, the woman's head was found buried in the basement. An autopsy found that Hope Parks died from a gunshot wound to the head.

According to court documents, Michael Parks decapitated his wife head using a miter saw before burying her head in the basement floor and moving her headless body to a bridge over Sugar Creek, where he left it slumped over the railing.