A friend of a man accused of killing a woman, whose severed head was found floating in an Everglades canal off Alligator Alley in 2007, testified on Thursday that the defendant prayed to an "Alligator God" after the murder.

Louis Caroleo, who's known Robert Mackey for years, testified for the prosecution recalling a conversation he said he had with the defendant.

Caroleo told the jury Mackey "said he was going to burn in hell, he wants to kill himself, he killed a girl, that girl was dead, the girl in the truck, the blue truck, she's dead."

Prosecutors say Mackey and another man Paul Trucchio, who is already serving time for his role in the murder, killed 41-year-old Lorraine Hatzakorzian, from New York, stole her pick -up truck and drove to the Fairview Motel in Port Orange, which happened to have a statue of an alligator outside.

Caroleo said both men "prayed to an alligator, rubbed his head."

When prosecutor Gregg Rossman asked why, he said: "They called it the Alligator God because they hoped that the alligator would eat the evidence."

What happened to the victim is as unknown as well as the location of rest of her body.

On Thursday, Doug Stine who met Mackey and Trucchio at the motel and later worked with them trimming trees, said he saw Trucchio throwing the license plates of the stolen truck off a bridge. Both witnesses said they saw Mackey and Trucchio cleaning the truck with bleach.

Caroleo also claimed Mackey asked him if he "knew how to change the VIN number " on the truck.

The state rested their case and the defense was expected to present their case at 1 p.m. on Friday.