Man convicted in murder of Chelsea Bruck

Monroe, Mich. — A man who admits he killed a woman after a Halloween party and stashed her body in the woods has been convicted of first-degree murder.

There was no dispute that Daniel Clay killed 22-year-old Chelsea Bruck in Monroe County in 2014. But jurors had to decide Tuesday whether it was intentional or an accident as he claimed.

Clay now faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison without a chance for parole.

He claimed Bruck was accidentally asphyxiated in his car during aggressive sex after a night of booze and drugs at a Halloween party in Frenchtown Township. But prosecutor Michael Roehrig said Bruck’s facial injuries showed she was beaten by Clay.

During his closing argument, Roehrig grasped the neck of a rubber dummy. He says Bruck “didn’t die accidentally.”