Pregnant Marine's Child Was a Baby Girl

Jan. 18, 2008 — -- As the search widened for Maria Lauterbach's suspected murderer, Marine Cpl. Cesar Laurean, initial autopsy results on Lauterbach's burned body, found buried in a North Carolina field, indicate that Lauterbach was eight-months pregnant with a baby girl (The Blotter) ABC News' Brian Ross reports. Earlier reports from Lauterbach's hometown in Ohio had said the unborn baby was a boy, to be named Gabriel Joseph.

The wife of fugitive murder suspect Marine Cpl. Cesar Laurean was riding in a car with her husband when he confided to her that he had buried Lauterbach, the pregnant Marine who had accused him of rape, behind their home.

Laurean, the father of the couple's 18-month-old, then confronted his wife with a wrenching decision.

Laurean asked his wife "if she was in on this," newly released court documents state. Christina Laurean told police that she responded with a question of her own. "I do not know," she said, according to the document. "Is there anything that you have not told me?"

It would be another 24 hours before Christina Laurean would go to the police with the grisly information, and her hesitation may have given her husband a crucial head start on a fugitive manhunt that has now stretched into Mexico.

Nevertheless, the Onslow County Sheriff's Department in North Carolina has filed no charges against the wife and considers her a cooperating witness.

It's now been one week since Laurean disappeared just hours ahead of a police announcement that Lance Cpl. Maria Lauterbach was dead and that Laurean was the prime murder suspect.

Newly released information, contained in Onslow County search warrant documents, provide a timeline of what Laurean shared with his wife about Lauterbach.

As Laurean and his wife drove to his attorney's office Jan. 10, the Marine stunned her by telling her that Lauterbach was dead and buried behind their house.

He told his wife that the pregnant woman had demanded money from him so she could leave the area and that he had bought her a bus ticket to El Paso, Texas. He said that Lauterbach returned to their house, argued with him and then slit her own throat.

Terrified by the scene, Laurean said he took her body to a wooded area near the house and buried her, according to information his wife provided authorities.

Then came the question and the wife's delay.

Laurean fled Jacksonville, Jan. 11, around 4 a.m. Four hours later, Christina Laurean turned over several notes that her husband had left behind to authorities. The police immediately changed the Lauterbach case from a missing person's case to a murder investigation.

The FBI has since displayed a Laurean wanted poster on digital billboards across the country and are working with Mexican police on the belief that he has slipped into Mexico. Laurean was born in Mexico and still has family there.

Letters arrived for Christina Laurean with Houston postmarks. The woman, who has been described by authorities as a cooperative witness, handed them over to authorities.

Authorities will not rule out that Laurean is hiding in the United States and say that possible leads continue to pour in from inside the country.

Onslow County authorities announced Thursday that a witness had also turned in the weapon that may have been used in Lauterbach's death, which the autopsy determined was caused by a blow to her head.

"We do have an item that we believe is consistent with the findings of the medical examiner and we believe it could be the murder weapon," said Capt. Rick Sutherland, spokesman for the Onslow County Sheriff's Office.

Authorities would not confirm a report that the suspected murder weapon was a crowbar.