9 March 2011 Last updated at 11:17 ET

TV boss Muzzammil Hassan gets prison for wife's death

Prosecutors said Hassan became enraged that wife Aasiya sought to gain control of her own life

A New York television executive has been given the maximum sentence of between 25 years to life in prison for murdering his wife in 2009.

A jury last month found Pakistan-born Muzzammil Hassan guilty of stabbing Aasiya Hassan and beheading her six days after she filed for divorce.

Hassan argued she had abused him and that he had acted in self-defence.

Hassan founded Muslim-oriented Bridges TV in 2004 in an effort to counter negative portrayals of Muslims.

Prosecutors argued Hassan abused his wife and attacked her in a hallway at the television office, after she filed for divorce following years of domestic violence.

He was arrested in 2009 after he walked into a police station in the city of Buffalo, in New York state, and told officers his wife was dead.

The couple had been married for eight years and had two children.