UPDATE: Lake Elsinore Man Convicted of Killing Girlfriend Won't Be Sentenced Until Sept.

A Sept. 6 sentencing date was confirmed Monday for an ex-con who killed a Hemet drug counselor he was dating and stuffed her body in a suitcase that he dumped in a motel room.

An 8-woman, 4-man Murrieta jury on Thursday convicted Joseph David Dorsey, of Lake Elsinor, in the August 2012 slaying of 47-year-old Christine Stewart.

During a post-trial conference at the Southwest Justice Center in Murrieta, Riverside County Superior Court Judge Mark Mandio upheld Dorsey's prior conviction as a serious or violent felony strike. As a result, the 28- year-old defendant is expected to be sentenced to 57 years to life in prison. The base sentence for a first-degree murder conviction is 25 years to life.

"This victim, Christine Stewart, dedicated her life to helping people overcome drug and alcohol abuse," Deputy District Attorney Burke Strunsky told City News Service last week. "The ugly irony is she had tried to help Dorsey many times with his own problems. That benevolence was repaid with his killing her and stuffing her in a suitcase."

The defendant took the stand in his own defense and claimed that he killed Stewart "in the heat of passion" while arguing with her. Dorsey learned that Stewart was seeing another man, Daniel "Blue" Loyle, who had asked the victim to marry him, and she had apparently agreed.

During a videotaped interview recorded by sheriff's Detective James Merrill, Dorsey admitted attacking his girlfriend of two years after the two finished having sex at his Lake Elsinore apartment.

"I mean we were in bed and we were laying there and we started arguing," the defendant says during the interview. "It was like that (snapping his fingers), and I had her pinned to the bed by her throat. It was like it wasn't even me."

According to the defendant, he strangled Stewart with a phone cord when his hands began to hurt. When he saw she was still breathing, he went into the bathroom, filled the bathtub and plunged her head underwater "until she stopped moving."

He stuffed the victim's body into a roller-wheel suitcase, then drove to a Best Western in Poway with the remains.

The 5-foot-2, 100-pound Canyon Lake woman's body was found on Aug. 8 by motel cleaning staff.

Dorsey fled to Mexico and was arrested on Oct. 23 in Playas de Rosarito.

Court records show that the defendant was convicted in 2006 of assault and battery on a peace officer, for which he was sentenced to three years in prison.

He was also convicted last June of attempted burglary. According to court records, he originally was charged with burglary and grand theft in that case, but under a plea agreement, the two felony charges were dropped and replaced with the lesser count, resulting in a one-year prison sentence.

With credit for time served in jail and additional state credit to minimize prison overcrowding, Dorsey was allowed to go free.

—City News Service.