GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WZZM) – A Grand Rapids man will stand trial for allegedly killing his girlfriend and staging the death as a traffic accident and fire along Int. 96 near Coopersville.
Donald Alexander Spice appeared in Grand Rapids District Court Tuesday for a preliminary hearing in the Nov. 9th death of 37-year-old Lori Marie Vargas.
Prosecutors today added a second charge of mutilation of a body. Judge Jeanine Laville determined there was enough evidence to send the case to trial. The added count of mutilating a body is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
Grand Rapids police say Spice admitted he got into an argument with Vargas at her home on Emerald Avenue south of Leonard Street NE. After crushing her skull, he loaded the woman's body into a car and headed into Ottawa County, investigators say.
Passersby reported a car fire beside the freeway east of 48th Avenue in Wright Township. Responding crews found her body inside.
Ottawa County deputies picked up Spice as he walked along Ironwood Street near 8th Avenue, a few miles from the fire.
Neighbors say Spice and Vargas lived together at the home on Emerald; that's where police believe Vargas was murdered.
Spice, 46, is being held without bond in the Kent County Jail. He was once dubbed the "night hawk'' for scores of home break-ins in the late 1990s. Spice was sentenced in June, 1998 to between five and 10 years in prison.
The Kent County Sheriff's Department at the time attributed 1,200 break-ins to Spice. He was discharged from the prison system in Feb. 2014.
