Editor’s note: The story below contains graphic details. Reader discretion is advised.
A Prince George’s County, Maryland, woman was sentenced to life in prison without parole Wednesday after she murdered and dismembered her 71-year-old mother.
Candace Craig, 46, was found guilty last November. She and her daughter, Salia Hardy, 21, were charged in 2023 in the death of Margaret Craig.
Hardy provided critical testimony in the case against her mother and was sentenced in December to time served.
Disturbing images — including graphic photos of grilled body parts — were brought forward as part of the prosecution. It was argued that her death was fueled by financial misconduct and fraud.
Authorities at the time described it as among the worst murders in memory.
According to charging documents, when officers were allowed inside the house on June 3, 2023, to perform a welfare check on Margaret Craig, they could smell three bags of human remains rotting away in the basement.
“To say it’s disturbing is an understatement,” said Prince George’s County State’s Attorney Aisha Braveboy after charges were brought. “It’s horrifying.”
“Words cannot express how devastated I was when I heard about this case, how angry I was, how committed my office was to getting justice,” Braveboy said. “And as with any case, it is not easy. There was a tremendous amount of evidence in this case. It took a lot to put everything together.”
Hardy, Candace Craig’s daughter and Margaret Craig’s granddaughter, is accused of finding the body in a plastic bin and helping to dismember and dispose of it.
“After that, she and her daughter dismembered the body, I believe using a chain saw, and then attempted to dispose of the parts of the body using fire on a grill and in a bonfire,” said assistant state’s attorney Jessica Garth.
One of those fires may have been set as far back as May 27.
The body was in such bad shape that the actual decedent has not been positively identified.
“When you’re talking about your elderly parents, as they get older, it’s our duty as children to protect our parents, and certainly our duty to not murder them and to then dispose of them in such a gruesome way,” Garth said.
WTOP’s John Domen contributed to this report.