ABBOTSFORD — A man convicted of murdering a woman and scrawling the incomplete phrase “Love Yo” in blood on one of her legs has died in a B.C. prison.

The Correctional Service of Canada says Frank Wilson, 79, died of apparent natural causes Dec. 28 after a long illness at a hospital in the Pacific Institution in Abbotsford, east of Vancouver.

Wilson was a building manager in a Kamloops apartment complex in 1998 when he made a series of romantic overtures to one of his tenants, 33-year-old Yvette Paul, sending her poetry and gifts, and painting the building awning and his bedroom her favourite colour.

After spurning his advances, Paul was found beaten and stabbed to death in her bedroom, with her throat cut.

During Wilson’s trial, Crown prosecutor Geoff Barrow said Paul told her family she was worried about Wilson’s behaviour, but she didn’t call the police.

“She lived a good life and attempted to be kind,” Barrow said. “In part, that’s what led to her demise.”

Wilson was arrested outside the building after he called 911 and said he had killed Paul.

He had slashed his wrists, but ambulance attendants said the wounds were too superficial to be lethal.

Wilson pleaded guilty to second degree murder in January of 1999 and was given a life sentence.