Extradition coming for the Allains

By MICHAEL KRUSE

The Allains are coming back to the Sunshine State.

When?

Soon.

Lori Allain, 49, and Arthur "Tommy" Allain, 47, the Hernando County couple who are wanted on child abuse charges and were on the lam for 21/2 months until getting arrested Wednesday in Toms River, N.J., made a first appearance Friday in front of an Ocean County judge and eventually waived their right to an extradition hearing - but not before they fought it for at least a little bit.

A specific date of arrival is going to have to wait, at least for now, mainly because of the Martin Luther King holiday on Monday, state-to-state paperwork and the setting up of the actual transportation process. But the bottom line is this:

"I imagine they'll be back down to you within two weeks," Capt. Robert Urie of the Ocean County Office of the Prosecutor said Friday afternoon.

"They're not going to be here this weekend," said Neil Sullivan, the Hernando County sheriff's detective who was the lead investigator on the search for the Allains, "but a week, two weeks - that would be a ballpark."

The Allains will be held in the Ocean County Jail in Toms River until they're brought back.

She is Inmate No. Y0051.

He is Inmate No. Y0052.

Their four biological sons, ranging in age from 12 to 17, are with Lori Allain's sister, who lives in Jackson, N.J., and it will stay that way, according to Urie, pending discussions between the New Jersey Division of Youth and Family Services and Florida's state Department of Children and Families. The judge who handled the first appearance was okay with that setup.

The Allains were arrested initially in June 2004 and charged with child abuse after allegedly starving their 10-year-old foster daughter to 29 pounds. They missed the start of their trial in late October and had been on the run - until New Jersey authorities took a tip from Hernando authorities and knocked on the door of Room 150 at the Toms River Quality Inn.

On Friday the Allains came in front of the judge at about 3 p.m., and the two of them looked a good deal different from the mug shots on the "most wanted" list on the Hernando sheriff's Web site.

Her hair was red and cropped, not long and blond, and he was clean-shaven - no more trademark Fu Manchu - and his long, pulled-back hair had been made high and tight.

They expressed to the judge concern over the placement of their kids.

The judge told them that ultimately will be a Florida matter.

Then they refused to waive their right to fight extradition.

So the judge assigned them both public defenders - which, for a brief time, meant they were going to have to get meetings scheduled with the public defenders, and that an actual extradition hearing was going to have to be set for a later date, and then if they still fought it at that point ...

"You're going to probably be looking at a protracted extradition," Urie said.

"It doesn't surprise me," Hernando's Sullivan said. "But it's their right to fight it."

And then Urie called back.

"They've had a change of heart," he said. "They waived."

Their extradition is expected to be handled by Orlando-based State Extraditions Inc., according to Deputy Donna Black, the Hernando sheriff's spokeswoman.

And then ...

"As soon as they return to Hernando County," said Assistant State Attorney Sherry Byerly, the lead prosecutor in the case, "they will be on the trial docket."

Michael Kruse can be reached at mkruse@sptimes.com or 352 848-1434.