Ex-Ludlow superintendent convicted of sex abuse brought back to U.S.
International fugitive Dennis G. Catron was scheduled to appear in Los Angeles Superior Court for an extradition hearing on Wednesday, but it was postponed.
A spokeswoman said the hearing was continued until July 27, but the reason wasn't immediately available.
Catron, 60, is the former Hoopeston resident and Ludlow superintendent who was arrested on a fugitive from justice warrant outside of his condominium in Bangkok, Thailand, on June 29, after being on the lam for about 19 years. He fled the United States in 1992 to avoid prosecution on charges that he sexually abused a 13-year-old boy in 1991, and was convicted and sentenced to prison in absentia two years later.
Catron was brought from Thailand to Los Angeles on July 7. He is being held without bond at the Los Angeles Police Department's Metropolitan Detention Center.
Vermilion County Sheriff Pat Hartshorn said that if Catron waives extradition at his upcoming hearing, his office will make arrangements to have him picked up and brought back to Illinois so that he can begin serving his prison sentence.
"If he doesn't, we'll start a formal proceeding for a governor's warrant to force him back," Hartshorn said.
Catron may have to appear at "some type of brief hearing" in Vermilion County Circuit Court before he's sent to the Illinois Department of Corrections.
Catron was arrested in June 1991 at his Hoopeston home after a Ludlow boy's father and stepmother filed a complaint with Hoopeston police, who then went to Catron's home and found the boy there. He was charged with sexually abusing the boy during six months in 1991.
The next month, he was charged in Champaign County for molesting two Ludlow boys, including the same 13-year-old victim in the Vermilion County case. He later was acquitted on the charges involving the other victim.
About five months after his arrest, Catron, who was free on bond on charges in both counties, failed to appear for his Vermilion County trial and then later for a Champaign County court hearing. In July 1992, he turned himself in to Vermilion County authorities.
That August, a plea agreement that would have kept Catron behind bars fell apart, allowing Catron to post bond again. A month later, he failed to appear for a Champaign County court hearing.
Catron was found guilty of the Vermilion County sex-abuse charges in absentia in May 1994, and sentenced to more than 20 years in prison that August. Authorities believe he had been in Thailand since he vanished in 1992.
This is unreal. First of all, Hartshorn is such a liar and Vermilion county has failed miserably!!! I can not wait until the FULL truth comes out. Lots of people going down, and I can not wait to watch all the liars fall. He was in court on Wednesday and waived extradition.. however, LA is STILL awaiting Vermilion county to contact them, and if they dont' arrange transport by 7/27.. LA lets him go. They already let him go once, and he purchased a bus ticket back here ON HIS OWN to turn himself in... but Vermin county would have none of that. He isn't LA's problem. So blame Hartshorn. Every time that man opens his mouth, it's nothing but lies. Each interview he has different answers. SAD SAD SAD that Hartshorn has no clue what the heck is going on. BUT *I* DO and I have tried to help them, but they apparently are insistent on messing this whole thing up. Stay tuned!
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