A Billings man accused of continuing to choke a woman even as police officers tried to pull him off the victim was charged Tuesday with attempted deliberate homicide.

Jacob Neal Carroll, 27, appeared in Justice Court by video from the county jail for his first court appearance on the charge. Judge Larry Herman set bond at $300,000 after Deputy County Attorney Juli Pierce described the alleged crime, saying that Carroll would be facing a murder charge but for the intervention of a neighbor who called 911 and the officers who responded to the call for help.

A public defender asked Herman to set a lower bond of $50,000, arguing that Carroll has no prior felony convictions and while he is from Minnesota, he has lived in Billings for about a year. After rejecting the defense attorney's request, Herman ordered Carroll to appear Thursday for arraignment in District Court.

According to court records, a woman called 911 at 2:55 a.m. Saturday to report a disturbance at her apartment complex at 209 Orchard Lane. The woman said a man and woman in the apartment above hers had been fighting.

The woman said she heard the victim calling for help and asking for someone to call 911. The woman said she made the emergency call when the disturbance got worse and the woman's cries for help grew quieter.

When officers arrived, they found a man sitting outside the apartment complex who said he was waiting for a ride from his friend, Carroll, and "they're going at it," court records state. The man identified Carroll and the victim, 33-year-old Tia Murphy, who lived at the apartment complex.

Officers knocked on the door and walked around the building, but couldn't hear or see anyone inside the apartment. They eventually entered Murphy's apartment and found blood spots in a hallway. The blood trailed to a door, where officers noticed two bloody fingerprints. The officers heard movement behind the door, knocked, and a man replied that he was using the bathroom.

After several seconds with no sound to indicate the someone was using the bathroom, the officers pushed open the door and found a man "straddling (Murphy) on the floor with both of his hands wrapped around her neck," court records state.

The officers said Murphy's face and lips were purple, she did not appear to be breathing, and they believed her to be dead. One officer tried unsuccessfully to pull the man off the woman. When the man resisted and struggled while continuing his choke hold on the woman's neck, the second officer used a Taser on the man.

The officers were then able to pull the man away. An officer was able to revive the woman, who was taken to Billings Clinic by ambulance.

Carroll was arrested at the scene and declined to provide a statement. A breath test showed he had a blood-alcohol level of 0.224 percent, almost three times the state legal limit for driving, court records state.

Pierce, the prosecutor, said Tuesday that Murphy was treated at the hospital and was released Sunday afternoon. The woman suffered some memory loss from deprivation of oxygen to her brain during the attack, she said.