Suspect arrested in brutal murder

 Body found 
 Crime report GRAPHIC 
VIDEO: Gruesome details revealed
VIDEO: Suspect arrested

CAVE CREEK - A murder mystery has now been solved, according to the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office.

Justin Lunsford is behind bars and stands accused of stabbing to death a 29-year-old Cave Creek woman before setting her home on fire. An MCSO report gives 3TV a little more insight as to what may have happened July 8 when firefighters showed up to put out a fire and found a woman murdered in her bedroom.

The details of her murder are quite gruesome. Mary Elizabeth Hermann or "Liz" as her friends called her, had been stabbed numerous times in the chest, back and groin. According to the autopsy, her killer even tried to decapitate her. After she was murdered investigators say she was stripped naked and left on her bed in a pool of blood.

Helen Ori worked with Hermann at the Buffalo Chip Saloon. She tells 3TV, “Everybody here finally feels some relief that somebody is being held accountable, but it’s still very scary.”

According to the MCSO report, Lunsford says he had met Hermann for the first time July 7 at the Hide-away Bar. They left together and went to Lunsford's drug dealer's house to get some narcotics. Then he says they went back to her house to have sex. In the morning she allegedly drove him to a friend’s house where he walked back to the bar.

Nevertheless, an interview with one of Justin Lunsford's friends provided a different version of what happened. This friend said he met up with Lunsford to grab some drinks July 8 just a few hours after Hermann was murdered. Detectives say Lunsford told the friend after he got to Hermann's house he was hit in the head and knocked out. When he allegedly came to he was tied up in the bathroom and Hermann was already dead.

Thinking he was being blackmailed by his drug dealer, Lunsford used gasoline to burn the house down before supposedly stealing her truck and setting it on fire at the intersection of Cave Creek and New River. Her friend says the story about the drugs just does not make sense.

“She would drink on occasion. She was a cancer survivor. She would drink on occasion…to do drugs? I don’t see that in her, I really don’t,” Ori said.

During the investigation, a witness claimed seeing a man leave the scene of the vehicle fire. Detectives say the description of that man is similar to Lunsford. That witness also saw the man leave in a green and silver pick-up truck. Investigators say they found that vehicle at Lunsford's parent's house.

3TV spoke to Lunsford’s mother, who said she did not want to go on camera.