Editors Note: The original version of this article stated the case is now in the hands of the Colorado Secretary of State’s Office. However, the Secretary of State’s Office is responsible for signing extradition paperwork for people being extradited from Colorado, but the office is not involved in cases of people being extradited to the state.

A Colorado Springs mother accused of killing her two children in December of 2023 can be extradited back to the United States on charges she faces, a judge in the United Kingdom ruled Friday morning.

Kimberlee Singler faces murder, attempted murder and child abuse charges. Her extradition trial began in September of 2024.

On Dec. 19, 2023, a person called 911 to report a burglary in Colorado Springs. When Colorado Springs police arrived, they found a woman, later identified as 35-year-old Kimberlee Singler, and an 11-year-old girl — both injured. They also found a 9-year-old girl and 7-year-old boy, who were both deceased, police said.

Extradition ruling for mom accused of killing two not expected until January

Singler had superficial knife wounds and was initially treated as a victim with her injured 11-year-old daughter. Both were taken to a nearby hospital, and Singler was allowed to leave because police believed she was a victim and a witness at the time.

The Colorado Springs Police Department Homicide Unit then took over the investigation and determined the burglary report was unfounded. Singler has denied that she harmed her children. She told police that her ex-husband had either carried out the killings or hired a hitman. Authorities said he had a solid alibi backed up by GPS records that showed he had been driving a truck at the time of the killings.

But that changed when her surviving daughter, who initially said she had been attacked by an intruder, told police her mother tried to kill her. The girl told police that her mother gave the children milk with a powdery substance to drink and told them to close their eyes as she guided them into a sibling’s bedroom, prosecutors said.

Singler cut her neck and, as the girl begged her to stop, she slashed her again. The girl said her mother had a gun.

“The defendant told her that God was telling her to do it, and that the children’s father would take them away,” Joel Smith (KC), representing the United States government, said at a previous hearing.

Investigators obtained an arrest warrant for Singler on Dec. 26, 2023. She was arrested in the United Kingdom on Dec. 30, 2023.

U.K. Judge John Zani delivered his verdict Friday, siding in favor of extradition. Singler has 14 days to appeal the ruling.

The timeline for when Singler could be expected to return to Colorado has not yet been released and could be delayed, should her appeal be heard.

Prior coverage:

Singler’s attorney had argued that sending her back to the U.S. would violate European human rights law, in part, because she faces a sentence of life in prison without parole in Colorado if convicted of first-degree murder. Such a sentence would be inhumane because it offers no prospect for release even if she is rehabilitated, attorney Edward Fitzgerald said.

Fitzgerald said that despite an option for a Colorado governor to commute her sentence at some point, it was “political suicide” to do so.

Experts for the defense had originally said that a life sentence had never been commuted in Colorado. But prosecutors later found that Gov. John Hickenlooper in 2018 commuted life sentences of five men convicted of murder.

The defense countered that three of those sentences were not life without parole and two were for men who committed their crime between the ages of 18 and 21, which is sometimes considered a mitigating factor at sentencing because of their relative youth.

“This defendant, Kimberlee Singler, has no real prospect of release no matter what progress she makes” behind bars, Fitzgerald said.

Prosecutor Joel Smith said the judge only had to consider if there is a mechanism that could allow Singler to be freed someday.

“Prospect of release — that is not your concern,” Smith told the judge at a hearing in December.

Zani said in his ruling that there was an option in Colorado to release an inmate serving a life sentence.

“I am satisfied that the defendant has failed to vault the hurdle necessary in order to succeed in the challenges raised,” the judge said.

Fitzgerald said he planned to appeal.

*The Associated Press contributed to this report.