A Japanese businessman accused of plotting his wife's murder in Los Angeles in 1981 arrived in California on Friday after being extradited from the US-administered Northern Mariana Islands.
Kazuyoshi Miura, 61, was arrested on the main island of Saipan in February and gave up his legal fight against extradition late last month.
He is due to appear in a Los Angeles court next week for arraignment on charges of conspiracy to commit murder.
Miura, who has been dubbed the "Japanese O.J. Simpson" because of the intense interest in his case in his homeland, arrived at Los Angeles International Airport from Saipan via Hawaii shortly before 5:00 am (1200 GMT) local time.
Miura was shot in the leg and his 28-year-old wife Kazumi received a bullet wound to the head in what appeared at the time to be a robbery in a Los Angeles car park on November 18, 1981.
Kazumi Miura was returned to Japan by the US Air Force and died in hospital after a year in a coma. The case became notorious and reinforced Japanese perceptions of the US as a violent country.
But a series of Japanese news articles in 1984 started to change perceptions when a former mistress of Miura said he had asked her to kill his wife three months before the shooting.
Miura was convicted of attempted murder in 1987 for his part in the assault and a year later was charged for the Los Angeles killing by a Japanese court, although he was released after a successful appeal in 1998.
US judge Steven Van Sicklen ruled last month that Miura could only face conspiracy to commit murder charges in California -- rather than a count of murder -- because of double jeopardy rules.
However, prosecutors in Los Angeles on Thursday said they would seek to reinstate a charge of murder, challenging Van Sicklen's ruling.
Los Angeles Police Department detectives said they supported the prosecutors' moves.
"We fully support that request," said LAPD Captain Denis Cremins. "Detectives who have been involved in this investigation have no doubt that Mr. Miura is responsible for his wife's death."
