Ruth Neslund Dies Serving Life Sentence

PURDY, Pierce County

Ruth Neslund, 73, a Lopez Island woman convicted of shooting and dismembering her husband, Rolf, 13 years ago, died early yesterday in the Women's Correction Center of a blood clot in a lung. She was serving a life sentence.

Rolf Neslund, a ship's pilot who retired after a freighter he was guiding struck the West Seattle bridge in 1978, vanished in 1980. Prosecutors contended she shot him, dismembered the body and burned it in the back yard of the couple's home.

She claimed her husband, then 80, had left their home, saying he intended to visit his native Norway.