The man charged in a nearly decade old murder made a brief court appearance via closed circuit television Monday.
Barry David Brown, 50, is charged with second degree murder in connection to the shooting death of Corinne Belanger, 37, in her northeast home in 2001.
Brown was a friend of Belanger's estranged husband and was questioned at the time of the murder, but never charged.
Belanger's mother, Lily Belanger, was in court Monday.
She says the break in the case comes as a huge relief for the family, which has been living a nightmare since the murder.
"It was out of the blue. I had given up all hope," Lily Belanger told CTV News.
Police say one of the breaks in the case came from small DNA samples pulled from the home nearly a decade ago. Back then, the technology didn't exist to test tiny samples, but now it does.
They always suspected Belanger was killed by someone she knew since the house hadn't been broken into.
Officers interviewed her estranged husband several times, but police now say he had nothing to do with the death of his wife and he's shocked that a friend of his has been charged with her murder.
Belanger's family is relieved charges have finally been laid.
"The family is very gratified to the efforts of the Calgary Police and any other police agencies that were involved with this. We just hope that the other unsolved murders that they are working on as well will come to a very satisfactory conclusion at some point," said Belanger's brother-in-law Hugh Tanner.
Police say they did interview Brown at the time of the killing but didn't have enough evidence to arrest him.
Brown's next court appearance is scheduled for January 13, 2011.
