Kaitlin Armstrong, who was convicted of killing a bicycle racer in Austin, was arrested in Costa Rica after agents posted ads looking for a yoga instructor.
In an interview with 48 hoursDeputy US Marshals Damien Fernandez and Emir Perez said they flew to Costa Rica in June 2022 to find Armstrong, who was suspected of killing cyclist Anna Moriah “Mo” Wilson.
Wilson, 25, was found fatally shot at her friend’s home on May 11, 2022, a day after she arrived in Austin to compete in the 157-mile Gravel Locos bike race.
Authorities suspected Armstrong — who a friend testified was bitterly jealous of Wilson — targeted the cyclist, who briefly dated Armstrong’s on-again, off-again boyfriend, Colin Strickland, during their fall 2021 divorce.
A day after the murder, the yoga instructor was arrested at her home on May 12 on a misdemeanor theft warrant — in which she allegedly received Botox injections at an Austin medical spa in 2018 and left without paying — and was questioned by police and released. The day after the interview, on May 13, Armstrong sold her Jeep at a CarMax dealership in South Austin for $12,000, prosecutors said.
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Mo Wilson.
Moriah Wilson/Instagram
Prosecutors said the day after Armstrong sold her car to CarMax, she flew to Houston before boarding a Southwest flight to New York, where her sister lives. On May 18, Armstrong boarded United Airlines Flight 1222 at 5:09 p.m. from Newark International Airport to San Jose, Costa Rica, with a ticket purchased in her sister’s name.
Deputy US Marshals said 48 hours that while they were in Costa Rica they got a tip that Armstrong might be in a quaint tourist town called Santa Teresa. But when they got there, they had a hard time tracking her down. They decided to post ads looking for female yoga instructors to see if she would take the bait.
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“We decided to put out an ad … or multiple ads for a yoga instructor and see — what happens,” Perez said 48 hours.
However, after receiving no response, the marshals returned to the US. Back in San Jose, they were about to board their flight when they got the answer.
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“We bit someone who, um, identified himself … as a yoga instructor and said he wanted to meet us at a certain hostel … and we said … ‘This is, this is our chance!’ Perez recalled.
The two agents returned to Santa Teresa and began investigating Don Jon’s hostel where Armstrong was staying under the alias “Ari”.
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But according to Perez, it was not so easy to identify her. Armstrong spent more than $6,000 on facial plastic surgery to change his appearance.
“She looked like Kaitlin, but not 100 percent,” he said. “So I thought, well, how can I approach her or get close enough to start asking her questions if she doesn’t have any doubts, so I decided I’m going to talk to her in Spanish. So I only spoke to her in Spanish.”
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“I got a little closer because I saw she was trying to get to Google Translate on her phone and she held it up to me and I got even closer,” he added. “And I noticed she had a bandage on her nose and probably her lips were swollen. and I saw her eyes… The eyes are exactly the same as the ones I saw in the picture. And this is her 100 percent.”
With the help of local authorities, Armstrong was arrested and extradited to Austin where she was charged and later convicted of Wilson’s murder. In November, she was sentenced to 90 years in prison.
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Source: HIS Education