Woman Caught After 36 Years On The Run, Feds Say

A Texas woman was arrested decades after fleeing to Michigan, authorities said.

ByABC News
December 20, 2013, 3:41 PM

Dec. 20, 2013— -- A Texas woman on the run since 1977 from attempted murder allegations was arrested this week nearly 1,500 miles away in Michigan.

Kathlyn Regina Huff, 58, was arrested on Tuesday in Farmington Hills, Mich., a Detroit suburb, more than 36 years after she was indicted in San Antonio, Texas, for allegedly shooting her common-law husband in the head, according to authorities.

Authorities took Huff into custody without incident, they said, in what one neighbor called a sleepy, country neighborhood.

"It's a shocker because if it's been that long, if she's been around that long, I'm quite surprised," Patricia Kaye, who lives about a block and a half away from Huff's home, told ABC News. "It's a very quiet neighborhood. We don't have any odd happenings that go on around here."

Huff, who changed her name to Kathlyn Regenia Rose after marrying, most likely fled San Antonio between when she allegedly attempted murder in 1976 and the time of her indictment in 1977, Bozeman said. U.S. Marshals in Texas determined that she made her way to Seattle before settling in southeastern Michigan, he said.

"The Lone Star Fugitive Task Force out of Texas requested that we apprehend her," U.S. Marshals Deputy Robert Watson, of the Eastern District of Michigan, Detroit, told ABC News. "They developed information that she was in the Farmington Hills area."

The U.S. Marshals are not investigating any of Huff's relatives or friends, Bozeman said. "No information has been brought to our attention that anyone had any knowledge that she was a fugitive on the run," he said.

Her arrest came just months after U.S. Marshals in Texas established a task force to turn up the heat on cold cases, Deputy U.S. Marshal Chris Bozeman told ABC News today. It was the oldest case the Lone Star Fugitive Task Force's cold case unit had taken on so far, and contained particularly serious allegations, according to Bozeman.

"When you tack on the number of years that this person has been on the run, that of course adds more to it," Bozeman said.

Members of the Detroit Fugitive Apprehension Team, which consists of members the U.S. Marshals and a host of other local, state and federal authorities, took Huff into custody after watching her arrive home, approaching her and identifying themselves, according to the U.S. Marshals.

Huff was indicted by a grand jury in Bexar County, Texas, in September 1977, for allegedly shooting her common-law husband in the head during a heated argument the year before, according to the U.S. Marshals.

She is being held at the Oakland County Jail, in Pontiac, Mich., and according to U.S. Marshals, is awaiting extradition to Texas. She has yet to have a hearing and does not have an attorney, according to staff at the Oakland County Circuit Court and the Oakland County Clerk/Register of Deeds' office. A date for a hearing has not been set, according to the court.

A message left at a number listed for Huff was not returned.