Los Angeles -
A German man who passed himself off as an heir to the wealthy Rockefeller family is being transferred from a Massachusetts prison to Los Angeles, where he faces charges in connection with a 1985 murder.
“As we speak he is on his way,” Los Angeles Sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore said on Wednesday while refusing to give further details about the suspect's time of arrival.
“There are people who have more than a passing interest in this guy,” he added.
Fifty-year-old Christian Gerhartsreiter was charged last March in the February 1985 murder of his former landlord John Sohus. Gerhartsreiter will go before a judge on Friday. His bail has been set at $10 million, said Whitmore.
The victim and his wife were last seen in 1985. A short time after their disappearance, a man calling himself Christopher Chichester, who was living in a home behind the victim's in San Marino in the Northeast of Los Angeles, also vanished.
Investigators discovered that Christopher Chichester was one of many aliases used by Gerhartsreiter, who also passed himself off as a member of the wealthy Rockefeller family.
The body of John Sohus was finally discovered in 1994 in the Sohus garden. His wife has never been found.
“An investigation determined he was killed by blunt force trauma to the head,” said Jane Robinson, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office.
If found guilty, Gerhartsreiter faces a possible prison sentence of 26 years to life, according to the prosecution.
“Finally we believe justice will be served. This man will be brought to justice and face the full extent available under the law. It's taken a long time to get here, but we are finally here,” said Whitmore.
US authorities say Gerhartsreiter is a con man who entered the United States more than three decades ago and lived under a series of assumed identities, the latest being Rockefeller, a supposedly brilliant member of the wealthy clan.
Gerhartsreiter was found guilty in 2009 of kidnapping his seven-year-old daughter, and was sent to prison for five years. - Sapa-AFP