Whitehorse man faces extradition to U.S. on murder, robbery charges in Oregon

A Whitehorse man faces possible extradition to the U.S. to stand trial for allegedly killing a woman in Oregon. 

Cole Sinclair, 25, was arrested in Whitehorse last December on a warrant issued under the federal Extradition Act. He faces nine charges in central Oregon's Deschutes County in relation to the 2023 death of Evelyn Weaver, including first-degree murder, robbery, burglary and unauthorized use of a vehicle. 

The U.S. has requested that he be extradited for prosecution. 

Weaver, 28, was found dead in her home in Bend, Oregon — approximately 257 kilometres southeast of Portland — on July 18, 2023, according to a police bulletin, with investigators locating her abandoned SUV two days later in Klamath Falls near the California border. 

The court file in the U.S., including the indictment, is under a sealing order, with the Deschutes County district attorney's office, local court staff and the Bend Police Department refusing to comment on or confirm the existence of any charges against Sinclair. 

The extradition file against Sinclair in Canada, which is being handled by the Yukon Supreme Court, is also largely sealed. CBC News was able to access a handful of documents this week that confirmed several details about the case. 

The documents included a Dec. 13, 2024, application filed by the Attorney General of Canada on behalf of the U.S. for the "issuance of a warrant for the provisional arrest" of Sinclair. The U.S. requested his arrest, the application says, "with a view to his extradition to the State of Oregon to be prosecuted" for alleged offences including murder. 

Sinclair, at the time, was living in a Whitehorse treatment facility after being found not criminally responsible on account of suffering from an untreated psychotic disorder for charges related to attempted armed break-ins in the city's Whistle Bend neighbourhood in April 2023 and subsequent bail breaches.

Court documents from that case show that the breaches included Sinclair leaving the Yukon between July 1 and 26, 2023, when he was required to remain in the territory. 

Police arrested Sinclair on the extradition-related warrant on Dec. 17, 2024. 

Sinclair to oppose extradition request

Sinclair's lawyer in Whitehorse, Vincent Larochelle, made an application in January for several sealing orders and publication bans on allegations and evidence that could be presented during extradition proceedings. As part of that, he filed a letter of support from Sinclair's lawyer in Oregon, Todd Grover.

In the letter, which is partially redacted, Grover lists the charges Sinclair faces in Deschutes County, including three counts of first-degree murder, two counts of second-degree murder, two counts of first-degree robbery, and one count first-degree burglary and unauthorized use of a vehicle.

"The charged offenses [sic] stem from the tragic death of Deschutes County, Oregon resident Evelyn Weaver on or about July 14, 2023," the letter reads in part. 

"Ms. Weaver's death — and the resulting investigation by Oregon law enforcement — spawned a handful of media accounts … Critically, however, Mr. Sinclair had not at the time been connected by investigators to Ms. Weaver's death." 

None of the publicly available documents explain how or when investigators came to identify Sinclair as a suspect in the case and why it took more than a year before they sought his arrest. 

Both Larochelle and Grover, via a staff member in his office, declined requests for comment about the case, though Larochelle confirmed that Sinclair would be opposing the extradition request. 

A date for the extradition hearing has yet to be set.