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Jurors deciding the fate of Dan Leach II watched a chilling videotaped confession after he pleaded guilty to the carefully crafted murder of Ashley Wilson, which originally had been ruled a suicide. ADVERTISEMENT On the tape, Leach said his confession was motivated in part by seeing the movie The Passion of the Christ, and he also described in exacting detail how he carried out his plan. "I was like a machine with a program; I went in there and executed the program," Leach, 21, said to Fort Bend County sheriff's detectives. The tape was played as evidence in the punishment...

HOUSTON (Reuters) - A man who said Mel Gibson's film "The Passion of The Christ" led him to confess that he murdered his girlfriend pleaded guilty to the crime in a Texas court on Wednesday. "I assume full responsibility for my actions," Dan Leach told Judge Brady Elliott just as his trial on murder charges was set to start. "I plead guilty." A jury which had been selected to hear the case now will decide his punishment, which could be up to life in prison. Leach, 21, said he killed girlfriend Ashley Nicole Wilson in January because she said she...

LOS ANGELES (AFP) - A Texas man confessed to killing his pregnant girlfriend, whose death was originally ruled suicide, after watching the controversial film "Passion of the Christ", reports said. Dan Leach, 21, walked into a sheriff's office in Fort Bend County, southwest of Houston, to admit he made the killing of 19-year-old Ashley Wilson in January look like suicide, police told US media. "It's a very strong movie," Lieutenant Jim Pokluda of Fort Bend County' sheriff's department, told the Los Angeles Times. "It would make a man think twice about any sin that he has committed." The Times said...

RICHMOND -- Detectives say the death of a 19-year-old woman originally ruled a suicide has turned into a murder case after a repentant man who'd watched The Passion of the Christ confessed to killing her because she was carrying his child. Fort Bend County Sheriff's Detective Mike Kubricht said today that investigators thought Ashley Nicole Wilson had hanged herself in January. Earlier this month, however, 21-year-old Dan R. Leach of Rosenberg turned himself in after watching Mel Gibson's controversial movie about the last hours of Christ's life and Leach decided to seek redemption, Kubricht said. The young woman's body was found by her mother Jan. 19...