Murder trial in 2024 killing of Tatjana Stefanski in rural B.C. is set to begin

Jason Gaudreault, whose partner Tatjana Stefanski was found dead on April 14, 2024, after disappearing a day earlier, shows a photograph of her on his phone, in Lumby, B.C., on Monday, May 13, 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck

KAMLOOPS — The trial of Vitali Stefanski, who is charged with second-degree murder in the death of his ex-wife, is scheduled to begin in Kamloops, B.C., today.

Forty-four-year-old Tatjana Stefanski was last seen on April 13, 2024, at a property in the village of Lumby, about 25 kilometres east of Vernon in the B.C. Interior.

Mounties said she had been reported abducted and her body was found by officers in a rural area outside town the next day.

Police said at the time that a man believed to be involved in the death “was arrested in the general vicinity,” but the suspect was freed with conditions.

Vitali Stefanski, who had two children with his ex-wife, was charged with second-degree murder on May 31, 2024.

The BC Prosecution Service says the jury trial is expected to last about five weeks.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 25, 2026.