BANGOR - Police arrested a Bangor man with a history of crimes in Orono, Belfast and Waterville in the killing of a woman whose body was discovered last weekend in a plastic bag in the snow outside an apartment house.

Ashton Moores, 59, was arrested and charged with murder on Wednesday, police said. He was expected to make his initial court appearance on Thursday.

The body of the victim, 43-year-old Christina Simonin, was discovered Saturday evening near her Union Street apartment. Two teenagers who found the body said it was wrapped in a comforter and a tarp, placed in a plastic bag, and partially buried in the snow.
Police said Moores' most recent address was not far from where the body was found.

The death was declared a homicide on Monday but police have been mum on details. They aren't discussing when or how Simonin died.

The attorney general's office asked Bangor police to withhold details of the case, said Police Chief Peter Arno. "We're working hand-in-hand with the AG's Office to make sure we do everything we can do to give her the justice she deserves," he said.

Moores' criminal history consists mostly of setting fires, including one that claimed the life of a 76-year-old man in Orono in 1973. Moores was released after serving eight years of a 10-year sentence for the fatal fire.

Within months he was charged with setting five fires in Waterville. He completed the sentence in that case in 1989.

A series of Belfast fires that began in October 1989 was tied to Moores, who served 30 days in jail for a Belfast assault in 1991.

He pleaded guilty to arson and was sentenced to prison again in 1995 after admitting to setting a fire at his girlfriend's Belfast apartment in 1994 and another fire at his parents' Belfast apartment in 1993.

In 2006, Moores was convicted of criminal mischief in Bangor.

In Stetson, the victim's mother, Harriett Ross, said her daughter was worried that she was living in an unsafe neighborhood. The last contact Simonin had with her family was two weeks before her body was discovered.

Ross said she wants answers. "However she died, she didn't deserve it," Ross said. "I just want to know who did it and why."