UPDATED (2:45 p.m. ET): Adds information about Tonya Couch's status
The mother of fugitive Texas teen Ethan Couch, known for using an "affluenza" defense in a fatal drunken-driving accident, has been charged with hindering the apprehension of a felon and is jailed on $1 million bond.
Tonya Couch returned to the U.S. from Mexico minus her son, whose own deportation was delayed by a Mexican judge.
Couch arrived at Los Angeles International Airport on a flight from Mexico in the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service and was taken in handcuffs through the terminal to an unmarked Dodge Charger early Thursday morning. She was wearing blue street clothes and looked away from cameras as she walked, flanked by two marshals.
It was unclear why she was brought to Los Angeles instead of Texas, where she and her son live and where he was on probation for the 2013 drunken-driving crash. She will remain jailed in Los Angeles until officers can take her to Texas.
That likely won't happen until at least next week. Los Angeles District Attorney's Office spokeswoman Jane Robison said Thursday that no extradition hearing was planned ahead of the New Year's holiday.
Ethan Couch was transported late Wednesday from a detention facility in Guadalajara to one in Mexico City, the official said. The decision to move Couch was made because the Mexico City facility for detaining migrants is larger and better equipped to hold someone for days or weeks.
Authorities believe the 18-year-old Ethan Couch, who was sentenced only to probation for the 2013 wreck in Texas, fled to Mexico with his mother in November as prosecutors investigated whether he had violated his probation. Both were taken into custody Monday after authorities said a phone call for pizza led to their capture in the resort city of Puerto Vallarta.
The appeal filed in Mexico on behalf of Ethan Couch argues that deportation would violate his rights. Richard Hunter, chief deputy for the U.S. Marshals Service in South Texas, said Wednesday that the legal maneuver basically takes the deportation decision out of an immigration agent's hands and asks a higher authority to make it.
Such cases can often take up to several months, depending on the priorities of the local courts, he said.