A WEEK-LONG manhunt for a reality TV contestant suspected of having murdered his former wife has ended in a gloomy motel in a remote part of British Columbia where his body was found on Sunday. His death is being treated as a likely suicide.
Ryan Jenkins made his name on the fringes of celebrity afforded by cable TV shows, appearing on VH1 in Megan Wants A Millionaire, in which he competed against other well-to-do men to win the affections of a model. But his greatest fame was achieved in the past week, for much darker reasons.
Last Tuesday he was named as a person of interest in the murder of his former wife, a swimwear model called Jasmine Fiore. They met in Las Vegas in March while Jenkins was filming Megan Wants a Millionaire and married in the city soon after recording ended.
The couple fell out and, according to Fiore’s mother, Lisa Lepore, the marriage was annulled. However they are reported to have got back together in recent weeks.
Fiore was last seen on August 13th when she and Jenkins took a room in a hotel in Del Mar, California. Jenkins checked out alone the following morning and Fiore’s body was discovered a day later in Buena Park about 32km (20 miles) southeast of Los Angeles.
Last Thursday Jenkins (32) was named by police as the only suspect and charged with first-degree murder. By then, however, he was on the run towards the north in a desperate attempt to avoid capture.
Authorities picked up his scent in Blaine, Washington, just south of Canada, where they found his car and an empty speedboat, which he had used to travel towards the border.
He is believed to have crossed into Canada, the country of his birth, on Wednesday, probably on foot.
On Thursday, the day he was formally charged, he is believed to have checked into the motel in Hope, a small town of about 8,000 in British Columbia.
Jenkins’s body was found hanging in the room on Sunday morning. – (Guardian service)