A man who has been on the run for the past 32 years after being convicted of attempted murder has finally been captured in Mexico.
Greg Lawson, 63, could be seen laughing as he was handcuffed and returned to U.S. soil, the New York Post reported. He has spent half his life on the run.
The FBI has been searching for Lawson since 1991, and has chased down numerous leads over the past three decades across the United States, though the bureau had long suspected he had fled to Mexico. Then, earlier this month, the FBI’s office in New Orleans received a tip that Lawson was, indeed, in Mexico. Shreveport agents as well as those in Mexico coordinated with FBI Headquarters and the Mexican immigration authorities to locate Lawson and take him into custody. He was arrested on September 19 in Huatulco, Mexico, and deported for immigration violations.
“We want to thank our partners and the public in this case, who never gave up hope that justice could be served for Mr. Lawson’s victim,” Douglas A. Williams Jr., special agent in charge of FBI New Orleans, said in a statement. “There is no doubt that Mr. Lawson might still be in the wind if our partners in Mexico had not been willing to deal with this so swiftly.”
When he was 31 years old, Lawson attempted to run his childhood friend Seth Garlington’s car off the road. The two ended up in a gas station parking lot and a shootout ensued. Garlington survived his injuries and Lawson was convicted, but he didn’t stick around to hear the verdict. He fled and his truck was found just a block away from where the trial was held at the Claiborne Parish Courthouse. For 32 years, he remained on the run. In 2007, the FBI started offering a $10,000 reward for information on his whereabouts, KTBS reported.
Lawson came from a prominent family in Bienville Parish, and allegedly had gotten away with other crimes due to his family’s influence.
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On Wednesday afternoon, Bienville sheriff’s deputies went to Houston, Texas, to pick up Lawson at the airport. From there, they will take him to the Claiborne Parish Detention Center.