A 21-year-old Prince George man already charged in the slaying of a blind 15-year-old is facing three more first-degree murder charges for deaths dating back to 2009, RCMP announced yesterday.
Cody Alan Legebokoff, who is awaiting trial in the November 2010 murder of Loren Donn Leslie, is charged in the deaths of Jill Stuchenko, 35, Cynthia Maas, 35, and Natasha Montgomery, 23, following a 10-month investigation.
Insp. Brendan Fitzpatrick said the RCMP is not linking the new charges to the Highway of Tears investigation, which involves the unsolved murders and disappearances of 18 young women since 1969 along the 720-kilometre stretch linking Prince Rupert and Prince George.
“There’s no nexus between the victims on Project E-Pana (the Highway of Tears cases) and Mr. Legebokoff,” Fitzpatrick said. “First of all, you have to understand his age and the last victim of Project E-Pana was in 2006, and we’ve also eliminated it through forensics, so it’s not connected.”
Investigators say Legebokoff used social media and online dating extensively to correspond with friends, associates and potential girlfriends with his online handle, 1CountryBoy.
RCMP also advised that their investigation is continuing as they took the step of releasing photos of Legebokoff and his pickup truck.
Mona Woodward of the Aboriginal Front Door Society said she hopes this development resonates in B.C. so that more cases of missing and murdered aboriginal women and girls aren’t forgotten.
“When we heard about (the announcement of charges), it was kind of bittersweet, especially for the family members that were in attendance at the (Missing Women’s Inquiry) demonstration,” she said.
“There were tears of both joy but also reliving the fact that their family members are gone.”
Mounties say Legebokoff was arrested Friday at the Prince George Regional Correctional Centre, where he was awaiting trial in Leslie’s death.
Stuchenko, a mother, went missing in October 2009 and her body was found days later in a gravel pit off Otway Road in the outskirts of Prince George.
Maas, also a mother, was reported missing by her friends in September 2010 and her body was found a month later in a park.
Montgomery’s body has not been recovered, but Mounties say the evidence warrants a murder charge in her disappearance.
Local news from metronews.ca/vancouver
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