Extradition Delayed for UK Poker Champ Accused of Wife’s Murder
February 5, 2010
Marcus Bebb-Jones is accused of killing his wife, Sabrina, more than 13 years ago in Grand Junction, Colorado. The 2007 winner of the Grosvenor Grand Prix is currently being held without bail in the UK while the US government negotiates his extradition.
Bebb-Jones was arrested in November of 2009 at his Kidderminster home in the UK – more than a year after Garfield County, Colorado authorities signed an arrest warrant for the former resident of Grand Junction, Co.
The barrister representing Bebb-Jones has managed to cast doubt on assurances made by the Colorado prosecutor that the accused would not face the death penalty, in accordance with the UK’s extradition policy. This has postponed extradition proceedings until March 10.
September 18, 1997, Sabrina Bebb-Jones was reported missing from the Hotel Melrose that she and her husband owned in Grand Juction, Colorado. Two days prior, Marcus and Sabrina Bebb-Jones had left their three-year-old son at a babysitter’s home with the intention of visiting the Dinosaur National Monument in Colorada. Marcus Bebb-Jones returned later to retrieve the boy alone, but Sabrina was never seen alive again.
Bebb-Jones told police that Sabrina had walked out on him after a fight, as well as several other stories that contradicted eachother. A few days after her disappearance, Bebb-Jones went to Las Vegas, claiming that he was going to look for his wife. He is reported to have spent thousands of dollars partying in Vegas that weekend. Authorities claim that in the course of the weekend Marcus Bebb-Jones received a non-lethal, self-inflicted gun shot to the head.
Marcus Bebb-Jones sold the Hotel Melrose about ten years ago, and returned to his native UK. Police couldn’t even prove that Sabrina was dead until a break in the case surfaced in 2004, when a Colorado rancher found a human skull that dental records revealed to belong to Sabrina Bebb-Jones.
The US government claims that the case compiled against the accused is “very strong.” The UK government will likely seek to further reduce the maximum possible sentence Marcus Bebb-Jones can receive. It is also anticipated that the UK will push for Bebb-Jones’ sentence to be served in the UK, in the interest of his and Sabrina’s now 16 year old son.
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