District attorney’s office: Missing ‘affluenza’ teen, mother detained in Mexico

His case made national headlines twice: When a defense witness testified that he suffered from “affluenza”, too influenced by privilege and his parents’ permissiveness to know right from wrong; and when a judge appeared to accept the argument and sentenced him to 10 years’ probation, rather than prison.

According to a police report issued by the Jalisco state prosecutors’ office, the Couches used one of their phones to order pizza for a room at a condominium in the beach resort city of Puerto Vallarta.

The prosecutor’s office said the pair will be deported to the United States.

On Monday evening, two people matching the Couches’ description were spotted and intercepted.

Given the busy travel season on the Mexican coast, authorities are still working out travel logistics, Vera said.

Sheriff Dee Anderson said last week it was possible the teen and his mother had fled the country, and the home they shared had been cleared of its contents.

“They had planned to disappear”, Anderson told a news conference in Fort Worth, Texas. “The details of the crime, and then the lack of justice in the sentence, outraged people in this area in a way that I haven’t ever seen people outraged”.

They believed they would blend in with tourists in Puerto Vallarta and were living a “cash existence” as to not leave behind a money trail, the sheriff said.

“I would like for him to be held accountable as I’ve said all along”, Anderson said.

On Tuesday the Tarrant County, Texas sherrif’s department said it had yet to be proven if Couch is the person who appears in the video.

Even though Couch is 18, his probation was still being handled by juvenile court, which means that officials would only be able to put him in detention until his 19th birthday in April, at which point he would have to be released, Wilson told reporters.

The Tarrant County District Attorney’s office also confirmed the two had been detained.

If Couch were transferred into the adult system, he could face 120 days in jail for not meeting with his probation officer as required.

Couch, now 18, was placed on probation after a deadly drunken driving wreck but fled the country as authorities began investigating whether he violated terms of his sentence.

At a previously scheduled January 19 court hearing, Wilson had planned to ask a judge to transfer Couch’s case into the adult court system from the juvenile system, putting Couch under stricter supervision and leaving him open to harsher punishment if he violated probation.

He and his mother, Ms Tonya Couch, 48, disappeared this month, prompting officials in Tarrant County, Texas, to place the teen on the county’s most wanted list and issue a warrant for his arrest.

The official said the Couches will stay at immigration facilities in Jalisco’s state capital, Guadalajara, where they will be given food and rooms with beds.

The owner of a local eatery said Couch went into the restaurant a couple of times and sat at a table in the back.

Couch’s attorneys, Scott Brown and Reagan Wynn, said they won’t comment until they speak with him, which likely won’t happen before Couch reaches the U.S.

The exception was Jean Boyd, the juvenile court judge at the time who sentenced him to 10 years probation despite hearing evidence that he stole beer from a Walmart, drove excessively drunk and high on Valium, crashed his daddy’s pickup into people trying to help a stranded driver and walked away with four dead and others seriously injured.

In December 2013, the Texas teen pleaded guilty in juvenile court to manslaughter and assault while intoxicated.