A Georgia man confessed to murdering his girlfriend after she allegedly “disrespected” him with offensive language. He brutally beat and strangled her before wrapping her in a comforter and placing her body in a suitcase. Following the incident, he reportedly went to work and purchased lottery tickets, as disclosed by prosecutors.

Last week, Frederick Durham from Upson County was convicted of multiple charges, including malice murder, felony murder, aggravated assault, and concealing a death. This verdict is connected to the horrific murder, as announced by the Griffin Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office.

Durham has been sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for the murder of his girlfriend, Margaret Dubinion, which took place in October 2023.

According to a press release from the DA’s office, Dubinion was at her Thomaston home with Durham, who was her live-in boyfriend. In his confession, Durham claimed Dubinion would not stop calling him vulgar names and fussing at him. His response was to restrain her with his left hand while assaulting her with his right.

During the attack, Dubinion sustained numerous severe injuries, including brain bleeding, swollen eyes, fractured ribs, and broken cervical bones. Durham ultimately strangled her to death and then “folded her up into a suitcase,” as detailed by the DA’s office.

“After leaving the suitcase in the closet, [Durham] went to work, went to buy lottery tickets and then went to Atlanta in the victim’s car,” according to prosecutors. “He told the police he was not sure if she was alive or dead when he put her in the suitcase, but when pushed on the issue, would not give the family peace with a definite answer.”

Dubinion’s relatives had been the ones who first notified police after she disappeared on a Friday, Oct. 20, 2023. A welfare check was conducted that night at the home where she was living with Durham, and neither she nor Durham were present.

The family went over to the couple’s apartment and found Dubinion stowed in the closet the following morning.

“This defendant had a malignant and abandoned heart,” Senior Assistant District Attorney Audrey D. Holliday said in a statement after Durham’s conviction. “He left Ms. Dubinion in a suitcase and refused to give this family an answer on whether she was alive or dead when he did so. I am grateful the family helped us bring Frederick Durham to justice by their persistence in searching for Ms. Dubinion and by testifying against the Defendant.”

Holliday added, “This was an evil act from a person who had no compassion for this family.”