FORT WORTH, Texas _ Ethan Couch's lawyers are seeking his release from jail, claiming the judgments imposed by Tarrant County Criminal Court Judge Wayne Salvant are null and void.
In a motion filed Tuesday, Couch's lawyers Scott Brown and Reagan Wynn say the case against the so-called affluenza teen is a civil juvenile proceeding rather than a criminal prosecution and is pending in court solely on the basis of a juvenile adjudication.
"There is no provision in either the Code of Criminal Procedure or the Family Code that allows the State, the District Clerk, or any court to convert this single juvenile adjudication of delinquency into four adult felony cases," the motion says.
The district attorney's office could not comment on the motion because the case is under a gag order, said Sam Jordan, the communications officer. Couch's attorneys were not immediately available for comment.
Couch killed four people in a DWI crash in 2013 and was sentenced to 10 years of probation. During his trial, a psychologist testified Couch suffered from "affluenza" _ the idea that his parents' coddling warped his sense of right and wrong.
His case was transferred to the adult court system in April, when he turned 19. In May, he was transferred from Tarrant County's maximum-security jail to a "less restrictive" facility.
Couch has been in isolation at the county's Lon Evans Correction Center in downtown Fort Worth since Feb. 5, when a judge transferred him from the county's juvenile jail. He was returned to North Texas from Mexico in January after he skipped a probation appointment and fled the country with his mother.
Couch's mother, Tanya Couch, is awaiting trial on charges related to her son's flight to Mexico. Her bond conditions were amended in August and she no longer has to stay at home 24 hours a day, but still has to wear a GPS monitor, pay a monthly fee for the monitoring program and abstain from drugs and alcohol.
