CHICAGO — A former Northwestern University professor accused of murder waived extradition at a hearing Monday and will soon head back to Chicago.
News accounts from a court hearing Monday in California reported that Wyndham Lathem did not protest attempts to bring him to Chicago to face charges that he and another man stabbed Trenton Cornell-Duranleau to death last month.
"Extradition was waived today and Dr. Lathem will be headed back to Chicago in the next couple of weeks," attorney Kenneth Wine said outside the hearing, according to ABC-7 News.
Wine said he didn't know what happened that led to Cornell-Duranleau's murder, but told reporters friends and colleagues described Lathem as a "kind, intelligent and gentle soul and a loyal and trusted friend," the TV station said.
"What he is accused of is totally contrary to the way he has lived his entire life," Wine said.
Meanwhile, Northwestern fired Lathem Monday. Lathem had been at NU for 10 years and was an associate professor of microbiology-immunology.
"Lathem was terminated for the act of fleeing from police when there was an arrest warrant out for him," the university said in a statement.
Lathem and Oxford University employee Andrew Warren have been on the run since the slaying of 26-year-old Cornell-Duranleau July 27 in Lathem's 10th-floor apartment at the Grand Plaza, 540 N. State Street, authorities allege. Cornell-Duranleau was found stabbed about 8:30 p.m. that evening and was pronounced dead at 9:05 p.m.
Lathem sent a video to several friends and family members where he apologized for his involvement in the slaying, police said. U.S. Marshals, who helped Chicago Police with the case, spoke with several of the people who received the video, but police were not able to say what Lathem said in the video.
They turned themselves in to authorities Friday.
Warren faces a hearing later in the week.