Australian man arrested and accused of murdering his wife

An Australian man was arrested Friday and charged with beating his Canadian wife to death with a hammer, Thai police said. The arrest took place shortly after the body of Barbara Lynn Mceod, 61, was found dumped in bushes in a residential area of the Thai capital, said police Maj. Gen. Kosin Hintow.

Her husband, Stewart Keith Mceod, 44, went to police early Friday morning to report that his wife had left the house and not returned for several hours, saying that he was concerned both for her safety and his own.

Detecting suspicious behavior, police interrogated Mceod for several hours before he confessed to beating his wife to death with a hammer and disposing of her body in the bushes, Kosin said.

Mceod, an employee of True Corporation, a communications company, is in police custody pending trial, while the body of his wife has been sent to the Police Hospital for an autopsy, police said. The hometowns of the couple were not immediately available, reports the AP. I.L.