Page 7 - AT

A7
U.S. NEWS Wednesday 6 november 2019
Son: Extradition apparently

underway for Lithuanian ex-judge

By MICHAEL TARM She fled the Baltic nation The 7th U.S. Circuit Court
AP Legal Affairs Writer with Venckus, then a teen- of Appeals ruled in July
CHICAGO (AP) — The son ager, to seek political asy- that if the U.S. didn't fulfill
of a former Lithuanian law- lum in the U.S. in 2013. They its obligations under extra-
maker and judge wanted settled in the Chicago sub- dition treaties by returning
in her homeland in con- urb of Crystal Lake, where Venckiene to Lithuania,
nection to claims she friends described her as "the United States risks los-
made about a pedophile bright and kind but trau- ing the ability to obtain the
ring said Tuesday that his matized by the drama that extraditions of people who
mother's extradition from engulfed her in Lithuania. commit crimes here and
Chicago appears to be Venckiene was working as flee to other countries." This 2012 photo provided by Juozas Valiusaitis shows Neringa
underway. Karolis Venckus a florist when U.S. agents Venckiene was a central Venckiene in Lithuania.
tells The Associated Press arrested her in 2018 at Lith- figure in a scandal that Associated Press
his mother, 48-year-old uania's request. The charg- gripped and divided her video in which her niece Venckiene's brother who
Neringa Venckiene, mes- es she faces in Lithuania in- nation of 3 million people. graphically describes sev- leveled the initial child-
saged him Tuesday to say clude disobeying an order She is viewed by some eral men sexually abusing abuse accusation and was
her Chicago jail guards to relinquish custody of her Lithuanians as a heroine for her. But authorities said a suspect in the judge's
told her to collect her be- 4-year-old niece, who she exposing a seedy criminal they weren't able to cor- murder. Months after her
longings and that she was alleged was victimized by network and by others as a roborate the girl's claims. brother's death, another
being taken away. the network she sought to manipulator who fabricat- The events surrounding man he accused died by
Venckus, who lived with his expose. She also is accused ed the pedophilia claims. Venckiene included the falling off an all-terrain ve-
mother in Chicago until her of hitting an officer as doz- Venckiene based her alle- slaying of another judge hicle into a shallow pool of
arrest in early 2018, says the ens of police pried the girl gations about a pedophile accused of molesting her water. Investigators ruled
two have been in almost from her arms in a raid. network, in part, on a 2009 niece, and the death of the death a drowning.q
daily contact.
Venckiene waged a nearly
two-year legal battle from
a Chicago jail to avoid her
forced return. A federal
appeals court earlier in
2019 deemed Venckiene's
extradition lawful and in
mid-October the U.S. Su-
preme Court declined to
hear her appeal, dashing
her last hopes of remaining
in the U.S., where she lived
since 2013.
Three weeks ago, federal
officials said in court filings
that there were no lon-
ger any legal obstacles to
sending Venckiene back
to Lithuania. Venckiene's
Chicago lawyer, Michael
Monico, agreed all signs
are U.S. authorities began
the process Tuesday of put-
ting his client on a plane to
Lithuania. "It's absolutely
terrible," he added.
A message left for spokes-
men at the Federal Bureau
of Prisons was not immedi-
ately returned. The U.S. at-
torney's office in Chicago,
which has overseen the ex-
tradition process, declined
comment.
The once-rising judicial star
who led an anti-pedophil-
ia movement in Lithuania
that swept her and six oth-
ers into parliament in 2012,
told The Associated Press
in an interview from jail last
year that because of her
work she feared for her life
if she was returned to Lithu-
ania.