Ethan Couch, 'affluenza' teen, could be free from jail by April 2016

After a Twitter user posted a video in late November purporting to show Ethan Couch violating the terms of his probation by drinking at party, Couch and his mother, Tonya Couch, threw what amounted to a going-away party, jumped in their pickup truck, disposed of their identification documents, changed their appearances, and drove from the Fort Worth area to Mexico to prevent Ethan Couch from possibly being sent to jail, Tarrant County Sheriff Dee Anderson said at a news conference on Tuesday.

Law enforcement in Texas and Mexico began a hunt for Couch, 18, and after getting a lead last Thursday, Anderson said, U.S. Marshals tracked Couch and his mother to an apartment in Puerto Vallarta, where Mexican police arrested them on Monday for being in the country illegally. They will be flown back to Texas on Wednesday, Couch will be sent to juvenile lockup, and Tonya Couch, 48, will be charged with hindering apprehension, which could send her to prison for two to 10 years.

Because Ethan Couch was prosecuted as a juvenile, for killing four people in a drunk-driving incident when he was 16, he can only be held until he turns 19 on April 11, Tarrant County District Attorney Sharen Wilson said. Four months of confinement, "in my opinion, is not a sufficient punishment for the taking of four lives," she added, but "I don't write the law.... We're still bound by the original sentence." In a Jan. 19 court hearing, prosecutors will attempt to get Couch's probation transferred to adult court.

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Couch's case gained national attention when a psychologist testified that the 16-year-old was unable to tell right from wrong because he suffered from "affluenza," meaning essentially that his wealthy parents had spoiled him. The case garnered outrage when a judge apparently agreed with that diagnosis and sentenced Couch to 10 years of probation. On Tuesday, Anderson argued that an international manhunt for a juvenile probation violator was justified because "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." As for Tonya Couch, he added, "there's just no chance that she will ever think [Ethan] needs to be punished or held accountable."