Bombshell confession raises questions

Editorial

July 31, 2007

Justice delayed doesn't have to be justice denied for one Talkeetna family.

The Corriera family finally has its time in court this week with Monday's opening of the trial of Michael Lawson. Lawson is accused of killing 21-year-old Bethany Correira just days after she moved to Anchorage to attend the University of Alaska. Lawson's brother, Robert Lawson, is suspected of helping Michael Lawson dispose of her body and torching her apartment. Robert Lawson took his own life in March 2006.

More than four years after Bethany Correira was killed May 3, 2003, came a bombshell Monday when, during opening arguments, Michael Lawson's defense attorney said he admits to having killed the woman. Claiming it was an accident, the confession is one more wound to open for a local family and a community that spent a year looking for Bethany before Robert Lawson showed authorities where the body was dumped - a gravel pit near Talkeetna.

While we believe in the Bill of Rights and every person's presumption of innocence, we wonder why it took Michael Lawson more than four years to admit to the killing, then claim it was an accident? While it's up to a jury in Anchorage to determine his guilt or innocence about his intentions to kill Bethany Correira, he's guilty of putting a local family through what no family should have to endure.

For a year, she was missing, her disappearance sparking a massive search effort. A reward was offered and for all that time Bethany Correira's family didn't know. They didn't know if she was dead. They didn't know if she had been abducted, nor if she ran off on her own. It's the worst kind of hope any family should ever have to endure - the hope that a missing loved one is alive while fearing and feeling for the worst.

For another three years there was no mention of her killing being an accident. It's a spurious claim, one prosecutors aren't buying. There has been no plea agreement, and it seems Michael Lawson's admission of accidentally killing Correira comes in the face of recorded testimony from his deceased brother, who was to be a witness against him and is on tape telling Michael Lawson he was going to spill the beans.

However Michael Lawson's trial winds up, we're confident the truth will finally come out, be evaluated by a jury and the Correira family will finally have whatever semblance of justice our system can provide. We can't possibly know the pain the Correiras have endured over the past four years, but hope they can find solace and peace for Bethany and themselves.