A 29-year-old convicted rapist who escaped from the Anchorage Correctional Complex's mental health unit in March has now been charged with murder in a 2008 cold case.
According to District Attorney Clint Campion, Kevin Tuckfield faces charges of first- and second-degree murder in the shooting death of Travis Villa in the Anchorage neighborhood of Mountain View in September 2008.
Tuckfield also was charged with attempted murder in the shooting of Morgan Meadows, Campion said.
Villa, 22, and his roommate Meadows, 20, were shot in their condo shortly before one or two suspects were seen fleeing the scene. One of the suspects took Meadows' pickup, which was discovered on fire later in the Mountain View Lions Community Park. Meadows was critically injured but survived, the Anchorage Daily News reported at the time.
"Tuckfield was a person of interest from very early on in the investigation, but there were developments in 2014 that opened the case up," Campion said.
Cold case investigators worked on the case, Campion said. It was later reassigned to the Anchorage District Attorney's Office, and he said he decided to go forward with charges.
Campion declined to detail last year's developments, citing confidential grand jury proceedings.
Tuckfield is also charged in a separate pending case with fleeing from the downtown jail's mental health unit on foot, Campion confirmed. He tried to force a woman into her car at a local car wash hours after the escape, police said.