He passed himself off as a member of the Rockefeller clan, and made headlines for kidnapping his daughter. Now, he's on trial for murder. INSIDE EDITION reports.
The man who posed as American royalty, calling himself Clark Rockefeller, made international headlines when he kidnapped his angelic 7-year-old daughter, Reigh, during a bitter custody dispute in 2008.
The dramatic kidnapping case was made into a TV movie, Who Is Clark Rockefeller? starring former Will & Grace star Eric McCormack.
After his arrest, police discovered that the man calling himself Clark Rockefeller was actually a German immigrant and he was wanted for questioning in the disappearance of a California couple—a mystery that remained unsolved for three decades.
Their names were John and Linda Sohus. They rented a guest house to a mysterious stranger. When they suddenly vanished in 1985, so did he.
The remains of John Sohus were found buried in the back yard of his home in 1994. Linda Sohus has never been found. Meanwhile, the mystery stranger reinvented himself as Clark Rockefeller.
A prosecuting attorney said in court, "The evidence will show you he was hiding in plain sight."
After 28 years, the phony Rockefeller is on trial. Defense attorney Brad Bailey says there's no solid evidence linking him to the murder. And in a dramatic courtroom moment, he claimed the victim's missing wife, Linda Sohus, may be the real killer.
Bailey said in court, "John Sohus could well have been killed by someone else. That someone may just as plausibly have been John Sohus' still-missing wife, Linda."
A key prosecution witness is expected to be his ex-wife Sandra Boss, a Harvard Business School graduate who married him believing he was a member of the billionaire Rockefeller clan.
Boss said in court, "One can be brilliant and amazing in one area of one's life and be really stupid in another."
He was sentenced to five years for kidnapping his daughter. Now, he could spend the rest of his life behind bars if convicted of murder.
