The 42-year-old man accused of killing his ex-girlfriend in Bangor last month was released from prison early.

Richard Keith Thorpe is charged with murder in the strangling death of 39-year-old Virginia Cookson last month

Thorpe was scheduled to be released on July 2nd, but was let out in mid-February, about four-and-a-half months early

Inmates released early in Maine earn sentence deductions known as “good time” for various reasons under state law.

Thorpe was released two months before Cookson death.

He was arrested more than a week ago in Massachusetts and returned to Maine earlier this this week.

A co-worker found Cookson’s body at a home on Larkin Street on Sept. 25 after she failed to show up for work.

The Maine medical examiner’s office ruled her death a homicide, and police arrested Thorpe last Friday in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, after a car chase in a stolen vehicle that prompted shelter-in-place orders at several schools.