When Will Brazil Arrest Christina Hoerig?
S.A. Torrence wrote a post for Wake Up America (cross posted at Digital Journal) about a woman called Claudi “Chris” Christina Hoerig. Chris Hoerig was married to an American doctor in the 1990s but they divorced after she ruined his finances and left him with a massive credit card debt. After that she married to an American soldier: Major Karl Hoerig – who served in both Iraq and Afghanistan.
It seems that she shot her husband three times in March of this year – “twice in the back and one point blank in the back of his head” – hid his body in the basement, “emptied his bank accounts which amounted to around $10,000 and wired $9,000 more to family in Brazil.” According to sources cited by Torrence she then “used her privilege as a pilot’s wife and procured a free flight to Sao Paulo, Brazil the same day.”
As of yet, Chris Hoerig is running around freely in Brazil. US investigators know where she is, but haven’t succeeded in convincing the Brazilian government to extradite her. Luckily, Congressman Tim Ryan ” is ready to introduce legislation which will put pressure on the Brazilian government.” This legislation would “call for re-negotiating the US/Brazil Treaty, and limit foreign aid to that country.”
Wake Up America has some good links up if you want to find out more about the case, but here are two she has missed: Vindy.com (short chronology – pay special attention to what Christina’s sister said when she was told by American investigators that Christina’s husband had been shot) and Air Force Times.
A new treaty is called for indeed. It’s always important to remember that someone should be considered innocent until proven guilty – and this goes for Hoerig as well – but the story indicates that if American prosecutors are able to do what they’re supposed to do, prosecuting her, they’ll have a more than strong case.
If you support Congressman Ryan’s initiative, here is a link to contact your Congressman / woman.
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Thanks for helping to bring this to peoples attention and for adding those two links. I am adding an update linking to this post for people to see your additional info.
I want to thank everyone for their support. As you can imagine this extremely hard to do for all the people that shared their life with Karl’s. He would have been 44 years old this December 24. A few years ago he gave my wife a picture and it had a quote from Mother Teresa. WE CAN DO NO GREAT THINGS; ONLY SMALL THINGS WITH GREAT LOVE. Thank you all, Steve Hoerig
Thank you for all the support. I’m sure dad would appreciate it.
Unfortunatelly this news is asking for something that will never happen, the Brazilian Constituition forbides the extradition on Brazilian nationals. That means she will never be extradited to US back, it is a waist of time but that don’t means she can’t be charged for her crime. The right way to do that is going ahead with her prosecution and sentencing her here in US. Once sentenced, the court have to issue a arrest order and send that to Brazil. She will be arrested there and will serve her sentence in a Brazilian prision. She can’t be sentenced to dead because dead sentence is illigal in Brazil.
Image copy of article at: http://i38.tinypic.com/29ygh9z.png
Monday, February 11, 2008
Extradition of Brazilian National Accused of Killing Spouse Not Likely
According to authorities, it is likely that a Brazilian-born woman suspected of returning to her homeland after being accused of killing her husband in their northeast Ohio home will not be returned to the United States for trial.
Prosecutors allege that Claudia Hoerig, 42, fatally shot her husband, Karl Hoerig, 44, at their Newton Falls home, approximately 40 miles southeast of Cleveland, on March 12 and fled to Brazil immediately thereafter.
A federal warrant obtained by The U.S. Marshal Service charges Claudia Hoerig, a naturalized U.S. citizen since 1999, with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.
Hoerig’s husband was a Southwest Airlines pilot who had formerly served in the Persian Gulf as an Air Force Reserve Major.
It was stated in an e-mail to the victim’s relatives from the U.S. ambassador to Brazil, Clifford Sobel, that Brazil has acknowledged Claudia Hoerig as a U.S. citizen, however, due to her status as a Brazilian national she will not be extradited to the U.S.
Sobel went on in the email to inform Paul Hoerig, the victim’s brother, that the U.S. is currently trying to negotiate a treaty with Brazil that would allow the extradition of their nationals to the United States.[6] However, Sobel continued by noting that, ”Even if this change is made, it would almost certainly not be retroactive and would not affect your brother’s alleged murderer.”
An extradition treaty was signed between the United States and Brazil on January 1, 1961.[8] An additional protocol was signed on June 18, 1962 which outlined a laundry list of offenses for which extradition can be had, including such crimes as malicious wounding, bigamy, arson, piracy, malicious destruction of infrastructure, counterfeiting, embezzlement, larceny, fraud, bribery, bankruptcy fraud, drug trafficking, and smuggling, among many others. Both the extradition treaty and the additional protocol to the extradition treaty entered into force on December 17, 1964.
Although the treaty and protocol have been in force for over 30 years, it still bars extradition in the following circumstances:
* when the requested State is competent to prosecute the individual and it intends to exercise its own jurisdiction accordingly;
* when the individual is already being prosecuted by the requested State;
* when the prosecution is barred by the statute of limitations;
* when the individual would have to appear before an extraordinary tribunal or court in the requesting State;
* when the crime is purely military; or
* when the crime is of a political character.
In addition, the treaty does not require either country to extradite its own nationals. However, if the requested State’s Constitution or laws allow for the extradition to occur, then the executive authority may elect to do so.
Image copy of article at: http://i38.tinypic.com/29ygh9z.png