BANGOR – A judge on Wednesday sentenced a Glenburn man to 40 years in prison for murdering a friend and dismembering the corpse.

Jimmy Lipham, 45, was convicted last year in the death of David Langway, 53, of Winterport on July 31, 2003, in the woods behind the Glenburn home Lipham rented.

Lipham was found guilty of murder rather than manslaughter after a 31/2-day trial nearly two years later.

The Alabama native, who had no criminal record, faced 25 years to life in prison.

“This was an assassination-style killing committed in a setting of trust,” Superior Court Justice Andrew Mead said in handing down the sentence Wednesday. “That finding alone puts it outside the minimum sentence of 25 years.”

The most aggravating factor in determining sentence, Mead said, was the “cruel post-mortem treatment of the victim’s body.”

“It’s just ghastly,” he said.

Lipham described Langway’s death as an accident when he took the stand in his own defense in June. He told the jury that he panicked after he shot his friend and left the body in the woods. Lipham also testified that a few days later he dismembered the corpse and buried the torso in the woods behind his Hudson Road home.

A partial skull and torso belonging to Langway were recovered from the woods, but the arms and legs have not been found.

Lipham wept Wednesday as he apologized to Langway’s family and his own.

“I’m truly sorry for David’s death and what I did,” Lipham said, his voice breaking with emotion. “I’m sorry for the trouble I’ve caused my family.

“I take full responsibility for what happened,” he said. “I don’t expect anyone to forgive me. I know I have to pay for it my whole life.”

Assistant Attorney General Fernand LaRochelle, who prosecuted the case, recommended that Lipham be sent to prison for 35 to 40 years. Defense attorney Bradford S. Macdonald of Bangor urged Mead to sentence Lipham to the minimum 25 years.

Langway’s three younger sisters – Sherry Langway, Geneva Langway Duncan-Frost and Cindy Langway Orcutt – wept and held hands as they took turns addressing the court. They asked Mead to impose a long sentence that would equate to a life sentence for the middle-aged defendant.

“He was quite a character,” Orcutt said of her brother. “He’d been through a lot, but he turned his life around and battled back from a serious head injury. He was a survivor. I guess that’s the hardest thing about this.”

Langway, who in his 20s battled drug and alcohol problems, had the “mental capacity of a 12-year-old” after a life-threatening motorcycle accident in 1986 left him with permanent brain damage, she told the court.

Duncan-Frost said that in the past few years, the sisters had lost their grandmother, father, mother and brother. A forester for 15 years, she said that she recently had quit her job due to the effect of her brother’s murder.

“I hope he never has a chance to hurt anybody else the way he’s hurt us,” she said of her brother’s killer.

Lipham’s wife, Kerry Lipham, who testified for the prosecution, attended the hearing but did not address the court, although his mother, sister and a family friend did.

Kimberly Wright asked for mercy for her brother. In reading her statement, she hinted that Lipham may have gone to trial to protect someone else, but refused to speak to reporters.

Macdonald said after the sentencing that he would appeal Lipham’s conviction and sentence. Before sentencing Lipham on Wednesday, the judge denied a defense motion for a new trial.

Macdonald argued that Lipham should be granted a new trial because he had met one of the jurors casually a few years before the trial.

Macdonald also argued that the T-shirts the Langway sisters wore for a post-verdict news conference were seen before the verdict was announced by Lipham’s relatives and, possibly, by jurors. The T-shirts bore a childhood photograph of the sisters and Langway with the words “Justice for David” printed above the picture.