Texas sheriff vows to find ‘affluenza’ fugitive Ethan Couch, who killed 4 while driving drunk

When Ethan Couch became a fugitive this month, the Texas sheriff calling for his arrest didn’t bother to hide his disdain.

In 2013, when he was 16, Couch struck and killed four pedestrians near Forth Worth while driving drunk. Prosecutors wanted Couch to serve 20 years in prison.

Instead, Couch got off with rehab and probation after a defense expert argued in juvenile court that Couch suffered from “affluenza” — an inability to tell right from wrong because he’d had a spoiled upbringing and wealthy parents who never punished him for bad behavior.

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That argument and Couch’s sentence didn’t sit right with a lot of people, particularly Tarrant County Sheriff Dee Anderson. When Couch became a fugitive on Dec. 11 — after missing a meeting with his probation officer — Anderson vowed to bring Couch to heel, and possibly to prison.

“He eluded justice after killing four totally innocent people and shattering people’s lives.... He never showed one ounce of remorse or regret or sorrow for what he’d done to those innocent people,” Anderson said Wednesday.

Worse yet, Anderson said, “His wealth and his parents’ abilities to hire the best lawyers and pay half a million dollars for him to go to rehab” instead of jail was “a miscarriage of justice.”

Within the realm of American law enforcement, dealing with fugitives is a relatively common phenomenon. In 2014 alone, the U.S. Marshals Service and its task forces captured more than 100,000 wanted men and women.

Of the nearly 4 million Americans on probation in 2014, about 7% had absconded from supervision.

Couch’s disappearance appears to have stemmed from his unpopular return to the news on Dec. 2. That’s when a Twitter user posted a six-second video that appeared to show Couch, now 18, clapping and grinning at a party where young men were playing beer pong.

The terms of his 10-year probation forbid him from driving and from consuming alcohol.

“Ya boy ethan couch violating probation,” tweeted the user, @BlondeSpectre, tagging the Tarrant County district attorney’s office. With a blast of angry and sardonic keystrokes, she added, “Ethan Couch? more like Ethan Ouch you killed my family and suffered no consequencjaldjwldjkz.”

The user, identified by local media as Hannah Hardee, appeared to have been joking, but like many Americans, she had been frustrated by Couch’s case.

She later explained she hadn’t attended the party or shot the video but found it on Twitter in October, telling WFAA-TV, “After seeing the interviews with the victims’ families and stuff, it just really gets to me.”

Prosecutors began to investigate, and Anderson believes that’s what sent Couch on the run.

With eight years remaining on his sentence, revocation of his probation could mean serious prison time. “That was obviously unacceptable to the mom, at least,” Anderson said, referring to Couch’s mother. “We believe with every bit of our being that she helped him, that she ran with him.”

Anderson also believes Couch and his mother, Tonya Couch, 48, may have timed their disappearance right after Ethan Couch’s last probation meeting so that they would have a seven- to 10-day head start until Couch missed his next probation meeting on Dec. 11.

Tonya Couch has been declared missing. Also missing: Her black 2011 Ford F-150.

The U.S. Marshals Service has put up a $5,000 reward for information leading to Ethan Couch’s arrest, and the FBI has offered its assistance.

Couch’s notoriety has already led to a wealth of tips, though Anderson said some were “Elvis sightings,” and the sheriff noted that Couch is no usual fugitive.

“They have a tremendous amount of wealth, and people with that kind of means can run and hide in a different fashion than you or I could,” Anderson said.

When wealthy criminal suspects flee prosecution, their high-profile cases have a habit of taking strange turns.

When New York real estate heir Robert Durst fled a murder investigation in Texas in 2001, he was arrested in Pennsylvania on suspicion of shoplifting a $5 hoagie and a box of bandages.

Durst was found not guilty, but now faces another trial in Los Angeles on suspicion of killing writer and friend Susan Berman in 2000. His case was featured in the HBO documentary “The Jinx.”

In 2003, Andrew Luster, a great-grandson of cosmetics giant Max Factor, fled in the middle of his trial for rape and was found guilty of dozens of charges in absentia, which would eventually result in a 50-year prison sentence.

Bounty hunter and TV reality star Duane “Dog” Chapman apprehended Luster in Mexico, but was himself arrested by Mexican authorities and, in an ironic twist, became a fugitive by leaving Mexico, although the charges were eventually dismissed.

Anderson is optimistic about arresting Couch, as well as his mother.

“He needed to be locked up two years ago.... I hate to say I told you so, but I told you so,” Anderson said. “There was no way he was going to make 10 years and keep his nose clean.”

Twitter: @MattDPearce

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