MINNEAPOLIS — A Minnesota judge has sentenced a man to just over 20 years in prison for strangling his girlfriend in her suburban Minneapolis apartment last year.

Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman said 26-year-old Joseph Porter was sentenced after pleading guilty to second-degree murder in the death of 27-year-old Cristina Prodan in her Edina apartment.

Porter admitted he got into an altercation with Prodan on Jan. 4, 2018, and choked her. Realizing she was probably dead, Porter put her body in a suitcase and drove to New Orleans, where he burned her body in a shipping container in a junkyard.

Prodan’s mother filed a missing person’s report with police.

Prosecutors said Porter agreed to a higher sentence because he did not call authorities, hid the body and caused stress for Prodan’s mother.