Prosecutors Initiate Process to Extradite Hughes From Texas

San Bernardino County prosecutors on Monday launched what could be a weeks-long effort to extradite prison escapee Jeanette Lynn Hughes from Texas after the convicted murderer refused to sign papers for a voluntary return to California.

Hughes, 36, formerly of Huntington Beach, would not waive extradition in a hastily called court appearance before a Texas state magistrate late Friday. The court proceeding was held after federal prosecutors abruptly dropped an unlawful flight charge against Hughes, clearing the way for California officials to seek her return on state escape charges.

Hughes, who told family members that she felt her life was in danger while in prison, escaped March 25 from the California Institute for Women at Frontera, where she was serving 26 years to life for the murder of her husband.

She was arrested at El Paso International Airport last Tuesday along with alleged accomplice Cindy M. Coglietti, 26, a guard in Hughes’ prison housing unit. Coglietti faces state and federal charges of aiding and abetting Hughes’ escape. She is due to appear today before a U.S. magistrate in El Paso.

Hughes’ refusal to be returned voluntarily prompted the San Bernardino County district attorney’s office to begin the lengthy extradition process. Prosecutors must obtain a California governor’s warrant for Hughes’ arrest within 90 days, or else she must be released from custody.

John Kochin, a supervising deputy district attorney, said Monday that he anticipates no problems in obtaining the warrant, but added that it could take several weeks to gather the necessary paper work in Texas and California.

Once Gov. George Deukmejian signs the warrant, Hughes has the option of appealing it and could thereby delay extradition even longer, Kochin said.

Sgt. Donald Marshall, a detective in the El Paso County Sheriff’s Department, said some out-of-state fugitives in his department’s custody have delayed extradition as long as a year by filing appeals.

Marshall added that escaped inmates like Hughes, who already are serving heavy prison sentences, feel they have nothing to lose by blocking extradition.

“It is just fighting the system,” Marshall said. “She has been in the system long enough to know how to fight it.”

If convicted on the state escape charges, Hughes faces an additional three years in prison. Coglietti faces a maximum of four years in prison on her charges.

Federal prosecutors in El Paso decided to drop the unlawful flight charge against Hughes late Friday because her escape took place in California, said Assistant U.S. Atty. Stanley M. Serwatka, head of the U.S. attorney’s office in El Paso. In such instances, Serwatka said, the federal government routinely defers to the state in which an inmate has escaped.

The federal charges against Coglietti will be pursued, however, because her alleged activities in concealing Hughes took place in El Paso as well as several other cities in Western states, he added.

Serwatka said Coglietti will probably be prosecuted in federal court in El Paso rather than federal court in California.

Immediately following dismissal of the federal charges against Hughes, El Paso County sheriff’s officials rearrested her on an outstanding fugitive warrant from California. She was then returned to solitary confinement in the El Paso County Detention Facility.

Hughes is being held in isolation and without bond because she is considered a high escape risk, officials said.

Coglietti also is being held in solitary confinement, Marshall said, because she could face harm from other inmates if they find out she was a prison guard.

Unlike Hughes, Coglietti has been described by federal officials as a low escape risk. For that reason, a U.S. magistrate set her bond at $50,000.

But Coglietti, who remained in custody Monday, indicated in court records that she would have difficulty posting bond. Both she and Hughes have court-appointed attorneys.

In a related development in El Paso, a federal court report made public Monday shows that Coglietti was heavily in debt when she fled California and had only $30 in her checking account.

The report, prepared by a court pretrial services officer, disclosed that Coglietti was paying more than half of her $2,900 monthly salary to cover a mortgage and payments on a 1987 pickup truck and four credit cards. Her mortgage was $1,052 per month for a house costing $118,000 in Victorville, according to her statements to court officials.

Although Coglietti said in the report that she co-owns the home with a friend identified only as Patricia Ross, San Bernardino County property records show that the property lists only Coglietti as the owner.

The court report also provides a glimpse into Coglietti’s background. Born in Upland to Ronald and Sandra Coglietti, she has a married younger sister and a 15-year-old brother.

After graduating from high school, the report said, Coglietti, who is single, moved out on her own in 1982 and has been living alone in Victorville.

Coglietti worked in a fast-food restaurant, as a bookkeeper for a relative and as a dispatcher for a defense contractor before joining the California Department of Corrections as a prison guard in 1985.

Terry Kincaid, an FBI special agent in El Paso, said that while Coglietti has admitted her involvement in the prison escape, she has not explained why she participated.