AUSTIN – A woman accused of killing a professional cyclist is back in Texas after her arrest in Costa Rica, where she fled amid a 43-day manhunt.
Kaitlin Marie Armstrong, 34, was arrested Wednesday at a hostel on Santa Teresa Beach in Provincia de Puntarenas, and taken to Harris County.
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Images from the U.S. Marshals Service showed Armstrong with darker, shorter hair upon her arrival at Houston’s Bush Intercontinental Airport.
She is expected to be transported to Austin in 10-15 days to face a judge for her murder charge, according to KPRC, KSAT’s sister station in Houston.
Authorities said Armstrong left Austin shortly after she was questioned in the death of cyclist Anna Moriah Wilson.
Wilson had been in Austin for a cycling event. According to an affidavit, Wilson had met with her ex-boyfriend and cyclist Colin Strickland, the current boyfriend to Armstrong, during the trip.
On May 11, Wilson was found bleeding and unconscious from multiple gunshot wounds inside a home in East Austin. Surveillance footage captured Armstrong’s black Jeep Grand Cherokee outside the home at the time of Wilson’s death, according to the affidavit.
Armstrong sold that vehicle for $12,200 on May 13 and departed the Austin airport on May 14, the U.S. Marshals Service said.
She flew from Austin to Houston, then to New York as Austin police issued a warrant for her arrest.
Authorities said she used a fraudulent passport to fly from Newark, New Jersey, to San Jose, Costa Rica, on May 18.
“The Marshals Service elevated the Kaitlin Armstrong investigation to major case status early in this investigation, which likely played a key role in her capture after a 43-day run,” Susan Pamerleau, the U.S. Marshal for the Western District of Texas, said in a news release. “This is an example of combining the resources of local, state, federal and international authorities to apprehend a violent fugitive, bring an end to that run and hopefully a sense of closure to the victim’s family.”