DA: May Take Months for Marine to Return From Mexico
JACKSONVILLE, N.C. — It could take even longer to return a Marine from Mexican custody to face a murder charge in North Carolina than originally thought, the district attorney who will prosecute the man said Tuesday.
Onslow County District Attorney Dewey Hudson said he learned that it could be three to four months before Cpl. Cesar Laurean returns. Hudson said that time frame assumes the 21-year-old Laurean agrees to be brought back to the United States without a legal fight.
The timetable applies "even if he's begging to come back," Hudson said.
Mexican judge’s recommendation just the beginning
Marine Cpl. Cesar Laurean, accused of murder in Onslow County and arrested in Mexico after a three-month manhunt, could not immediately waive extradition back to the United States even if he wanted to, officials say.
"I have heard the rumors that he will be back here in a day or two, but there is a process that will take a certain period of time," said Dewey Hudson, district attorney for the 4th Prosecutorial District, which includes Onslow County.
Laurean - indicted for the first-degree murder in the bludgeoning death of Lance Cpl. Maria Lauterbach in December and accused of burying her body and that of her unborn child beneath his backyard fire pit - had his first appearance in front of a judge in Mexico over the weekend, said Capt. Rick Sutherland of the Onslow County Sheriff's Department.
The judge recommended extradition, Sutherland said, adding there are steps to be taken and "we do not know what (Laurean) will want to do."
Laurean has representation in Mexico, said Jacksonville lawyer Wally Paramore, who has been appointed as Laurean's attorney by the state's Capital Defender's Office.
He said he hoped to be in contact with Laurean through his representatives there and would then have a better idea of his client's situation.
Laurean was arrested walking to an Internet cafe, where authorities said he had been using a computer to ask for help from his family - including his wife, Christina Laurean, also a Marine, who has been ordered not to discuss the case. She refused to send money to her husband, local investigators said.
The efforts of law enforcement to eliminate Laurean's resources led to his "impoverished state" living in a tiny wooden cabin and having 10 pesos in his pocket when he was captured, authorities said.
Laurean left Onslow County on Jan. 11 after becoming the focus of the investigation into Lauterbach's disappearance, authorities said. An Internet story about Lauterbach's disappearance and an attached investigation report about Lauterbach's rape allegations were viewed on a computer in Laurean's Meadow Trail home about 4 a.m. that day, detectives learned after seizing the computer.
Laurean rode a bus into his native Mexico, according to the FBI.