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Hope improved relations will bring fugitive back from Cuba

New Jersey State Police are hoping that the normalization of relations with Cuba will bring about the return of a 67-year-old fugitive convicted of murder in the 1973 killing of a trooper.

JoAnne Chesimard, a Black Liberation Army leader who changed her name to Assata Shakur, escaped from a New Jersey prison in 1979 and after several years on the run emerged in Cuba, where she was given asylum.

She had been convicted of killing Trooper Woerner Foster in a gunbattle on the New Jersey Turnpike in the early morning hours of May 2, 1973.

"We view any changes in relations with Cuba as an opportunity to bring her back to the United States to finish her sentence," Col. Rick Fuentes, the state police superintendent, said in a statement.

Chesimard is the only woman on the FBI's most wanted terrorists list and a $2 million reward has been posted for her return.