It was the "finger of God" that first pointed police to Angela Steigerwalt's killer, first assistant Lehigh County District Attorney Steven M. Luksa said.

On Tuesday, a jury convicted Anthony Darrell Heath, 26, of Allentown, of first-degree murder in the Jan. 31, 2014, strangulation death of Steigerwalt, 35, of Tamaqua.Heath used a speaker wire to strangle Steigerwalt in his apartment, then bound her body with more wire, and placed it in a plastic tote he had bought at Walmart within hours of her death. He took the tote to Flagstaff Road in Jim Thorpe, where he slid it down a steep embankment, doused it with lighter fluid and set it ablaze.Firefighters who extinguished the wildfire started by Steigerwalt's burning remains called police, who saw a Walmart bag resting atop her remains. The receipt inside for a tote, lighter and fluid led them to Heath."What I'll refer to as the finger of God put that bag, that was left to blow in the wind, it ended up on top of Mrs. Steigerwalt's body and it stayed there," Luksa said outside the courthouse."The bag was not charred. The bag was not singed, destroyed in any way. And inside that bag was the first break in this case. It was the first clue. And if the wind blew in a different direction, that bag would have been left to the ages, as standard debris off of a road in Jim Thorpe."Luksa said prosecutors did not pursue the death penalty because the case lacked the aggravating circumstances required for that penalty.Luksa also said Heath could begin to appeal his conviction as soon as he is sentenced, and that he expected him to do so.