Suspect returned to Va. to face charges in U-Va. case

CHARLOTTESVILLE — The suspect in the disappearance of University of Virginia student Hannah Graham was moved from a Texas holding facility and arrived Friday in Virginia, authorities said.

Jesse L. “LJ” Matthew Jr., 32, who has been charged with one count of abduction with intent to sexually assault Graham, arrived at Charlottesville-Albemarle Airport at about 5:45 p.m., Charlottesville police said. They said Matthew was being held without bond at the Albe­marle-Charlottesville Regional Jail. He is expected to have a bond hearing on Thursday. The courthouse is closed for a statewide judicial conference that runs Monday through Wednesday.

Matthew was arrested this week on a beach outside of Galveston, Tex.

James L. Camblos III, a Charlottesville lawyer who is representing Matthew, said that he advised his client to waive an extradition hearing, expediting his return to Virginia. Camblos said that he expects to meet with Matthew as soon as Monday.

Graham, an 18-year-old sophomore, went missing Sept. 13 after a night of drinking and socializing with friends. She apparently got lost while walking through Charlottesville, took a wrong turn, and ended up on the Downtown Mall, more than a mile from the center of U-Va.’s campus. It was there, police allege, that Matthew intercepted Graham and ultimately made off with her.

Matthew was seen on surveillance video walking with Graham on the Downtown Mall shortly after 1 a.m. on Sept. 13, and a restaurant owner said the two were seen walking away from his establishment together sometime later. That was the last time anyone saw Graham, police said.

Police believe that Graham was in Matthew’s car when it left the area. Police have searched the car and Matthew’s apartment but have not said whether they found evidence linking him to her disappearance.

raham has not been found despite nearly two weeks of searching by police and large numbers of volunteers. Police continue to look in and around Charlottesville, but they have no clues about her whereabouts. Police Chief Timothy J. Longo has urged area residents and landowners to comb their properties for anything that seems out of the ordinary.

Much of the region around Charlottesville is rural farmland in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. At Monticello, President Thomas Jefferson’s estate four miles south of town, workers have fanned out across 2,600 acres looking for clues, spokeswoman Ann Taylor said.

“They’ve been keeping their eyes open for anything which may be useful to the search,” said Taylor, who noted that staffers also have reviewed video surveillance tapes and checked pieces of the property abutting public roads.

At nearby Ash Lawn-Highland, the 500-acre estate of President James Monroe, staffers Katie Falcone and Brittany Harton spent part of Friday trekking through brush in a wooded area close to the mansion. Wearing jeans and sneakers, the staffers walked a dirt road in the afternoon sun, searching for clues that could lead police to find Graham.

“These look like fresh tire marks,” Falcone, 25, said. The women looked for anything out of place — “the pink phone, the white shoes” — references to what Graham had with her the morning she was last seen.

hey kneeled in the grass to peer through the dense forest. Then Falcone spotted an object glinting in a sunbeam cutting through the treetops.

“What’s that over there?” Falcone said. “Oh, that’s just a Bud Light can.”

Harton, a 23-year-old U-Va. graduate, s

aid that the afternoon’s effort was about helping the community in a time of need.

If I was missing, or my loved ones were missing, I’d want anybody that was able out searching,” she said.

Falcone said that the goal was to help police narrow down a search area.

“The more eyes you have looking, the better,” Falcone said. “No news can be good news.”

Maybe Graham is still out there, Falcone said. A second search was planned for Saturday, Falcone said, so that more staffers from Monroe’s former estate could take to the woods.