A man from Shawingan Lake was in a B.C. Supreme Court in Vancouver this week to defend himself against efforts to extradite him to the U.S.
Anthony Michael Kubica, 61, is facing extradition to California to answer to charges of murder and kidnapping in a cold-case file.
After two days in court, the case has been adjourned until Jan. 24 while B.C. Supreme Court Justice Jennifer Duncan considers whether to allow additional evidence.
A publication ban has been ordered on evidence presented in court.
Kubica is wanted in connection to the murder and kidnapping of Palm Springs resident Marie Darling, a 78-year-old wealthy widow who disappeared from her home 27 years ago.
According to the declaration in support of an arrest warrant that was filed with the Superior Court of California, County of Riverside, in October, Darling’s body was later found by hikers by the side of a highway in a sleeping bag with her feet wrapped in duct tape.
An autopsy performed on the body found the cause of death to be blunt force trauma to the head.
More than $184,000 was transferred out of Darling’s Swiss bank account to an account in Anguilla that Kubica, who lived and operated a company in Palm Springs at the time, had allegedly opened around the same time the body was found.
Kubica and his wife, whom the court documents refer to as CJ, were suspects early in the investigation but the trail went cold.
But a cold-case investigator is claiming that since then, he discovered that Kubica’s wife was Darling’s financial advisor, even though she’d denied knowing Darling during the original investigation. Kubica’s wife is now deceased.
If the extradition request is granted, Kubica will be remanded into custody on Vancouver Island until he is transported to the United States.