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Court to rule on man convicted of killing 2, burying bodies

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Posted at 10:33 AM, Aug 07, 2019
and last updated 2019-08-07 13:33:37-04

PHOENIX (AP) - The Arizona Supreme Court is scheduled to issue a decision Wednesday in the appeal of a Phoenix man convicted of killing two people whose bodies were found buried in his mother's backyard.

Alan Champagne was convicted in the 2011 deaths of Philmon Tapaha and Brandi Nicole Hoffner.

Investigators say Champagne fatally shot Tapaha and choked Hoffner to death, put their bodies in a box, poured in lime to help with decomposition and buried it at his mother's home.

The big break in the case came in 2013 when a landscaper at a home where Champagne's mother used to live discovered the buried bodies.

Champagne was sentenced to death for a first-degree murder conviction and to prison terms for convictions for second-degree murder, kidnapping and concealing a dead body.