Police Seeking Evidence Suspect In Slayings May Have Left Items Outside Moscow

Police are seeking the public’s help in finding several household items removed from a murder scene and dumped in rural Latah County or in nearby Washington.

Wenkai Li, who has admitted to a double slaying late last month, may have driven as far as 45 miles from Moscow to dispose of a door, a rug and other household and personal items taken from the victims’ home, Moscow Police Chief William F. Brown Jr. said Tuesday.

A knife used in the murder may also be among the items, said Brown, who is encouraging people to call even if they doubt they have significant information.

Equally important, he said, would be reports from people who may have seen Li, a 25-year-old Chinese man, driving the white 1995 Ford Aerostar that police believe he used to move the items on the Tuesday or Wednesday after Memorial Day. An eyewitness report could help investigators pinpoint the dump site, he said.

Publicity about the items has already yielded one tip that investigators were looking into Tuesday afternoon, Brown said.

Li, a University of Idaho graduate student, is accused of stabbing Ning Li, no relation, and strangling his wife, Xahiou Ge, on May 29 after Ning Li reportedly made an insulting remark about Wenkai Li’s girlfriend. After the murder, police say, Wenkai Li then cleaned out the victims’ apartment to make it look like they moved and took the bodies to southeastern Wyoming, where he dumped them alongside a rural road.

Li, who has been held since last week in the Albany County Detention Center, waived extradition Tuesday but authorities did not know yet when he might be brought back to Moscow.

Meanwhile, friends of the victims have arranged a memorial fund through the UI physics department to assist the couple’s 4-year-old son and help family members travel from China. A memorial service is being planned, but a date hasn’t been set.

Brown on Tuesday said Li had an unwitting friend rent the Ford van so he could move his own belongings, but also used the van to clean out the victims’ apartment on Lewis Street. The friend is not a suspect in the murders, Brown said.

Anyone with information is asked to call police Detective Sgt. Neil Odenborg or Detective Jim Kouril at (208) 882-5551.

, DataTimes