LOS ANGELES, July 8 (UPI) -- A former German exchange student who lived under false identities for decades appeared in a Los Angeles courtroom Friday to answer a murder charge.
Christian Gerhartsreiter, 50, pleaded not guilty to the charge that he killed Jonathan Sohus, ABC News reported. Sohus and his wife, Linda, who knew Gerhartsreiter as Christopher Chichester, disappeared in 1985.
Gerhartsreiter was using the name Clark Rockefeller when he married Sandra Boss in Boston. He was charged in 2008 with kidnapping their daughter, an action that led to the unraveling of his series of impostures.
Investigators say Gerhartsreiter or Chichester lived in a San Marino, Calif., guesthouse that belonged to Sohus' mother on the same property where Jonathan and Linda lived. Jonathan's remains were found buried in the back yard in 1994, while Linda is still missing.
Jann Eldnor, a San Marino beautician, said she cut Gerhartsreiter's hair every two weeks.
"He was a British gentleman," she told ABC. "He was just about 25 years old, but he acted like he was 40. He never worked, but he always dressed like a banker."
