( dpa ) - An Australian who hid his dismembered wife's body in a 44-gallon drum for 23 years was Saturday found guilty of murder in a Melbourne court.
Frederick Boyle, 58, had pleaded not guilty. He claimed that in 1983 Edwina Boyle, 30, had run off with a truck driver called Ray.
Boyle's secret was exposed last year during a backyard clean-up when his son-in-law cut open the drum to find women's underwear and a sack containing body parts.
Boyle told the court that he had returned home to find his wife with a rope round her neck and a bullet in her head.
He told the court that he made up the story about Ray because he was having an affair and believed the police would blame him for his wife's death.
He also said he hid his wife's remains in the drum because he loved her and didn't want to throw her out in the rubbish.
"My wife died in a terrible way and I was not going to let her remains be thrown down the tip like garbage," he said.
The court was told Boyle's girlfriend moved into the family home the day after Edwina supposedly ran off with Ray.
"He is a pathological liar and he has lied to the end," the prosecutor said.