Newly obtained court documents say the man who allegedly strangled an Arizona woman to death had stolen an SUV the week before the murder.
41-year-old Joshua Bagley was arrested back in May after someone called Phoenix police about a person on a city bus who was not breathing near 27th Avenue and Baseline Road.
These new documents state that Bagley had been stopped the week before while driving a stolen purple Cadillac SUV that someone had taken from a car hauler.
According to court paperwork, when Bagley was pulled over near 91st Avenue and the I-10, he had thrown a glass meth pipe over the passenger window, and officers found material that was consistent with making illegal drugs, including burnt pieces of foil. He was also booked on DUI-related charges. While Bagley was being questioned about the stolen vehicle, he refused to answer without first speaking to a lawyer, which he said he would do later. Bagley was later released, and Mohave County reissued a search warrant for his arrest hours after.
Days later, Bagley reportedly strangled a woman, identified as 41-year-old Diane Craig, on a Valley Metro bus. Investigators say that Bagley and Craig got onto the bus together and sat near each other in the back, and while it’s unclear if Bagley and Craig knew each other, police said they were the only passengers on board. Craig died while being treated for her injuries at a Valley hospital.
Bagley was found a few days later after a 911 call about a suspicious person.
Bagley was known to police and had been first arrested in April when Mesa police arrested him on a warrant out of Mohave County. According to the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office, Mohave County declined to extradite him and therefore released him from jail; however, Mohave County denied the claim.
As of Tuesday, Bagley remains booked into the Maricopa County jail, where he faces first-degree murder, kidnapping, and third-degree burglary charges.
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