Mourners attended a memorial service Monday night for Lance Corporal Maria Lauterbach in her home town of Vandalia, near Dayton. Authorities are looking for fellow Marine Corporal Cesar Laurean, a suspect in the death of Lauterbach who was eight months pregnant. They hope posting the suspect's photograph on electronic billboards may lead to an arrest.
Eight digital billboards in Columbus are displaying the picture of fugitive Marine Corporal Cesar Laurean every minute. FBI spokeswoman Cathy Milhoan says the Clear Channel company provides space when it's available.
"We launched the first billboard on September 13th," Milhoan says. "The billboards typically feature a crystal clear image of a violent fugitive as well as a 24 hour hotline for the public to call. In October, 2 fugitives were caught as a direct result of that publicity."
Nicole Hamilton is in charge of Clear Channel's Columbus digital billboards. She says the company provides the space to the FBI free of charge.
"As soon as I found out about it, we needed to get some information out to the pubic as soon as possible, we created the template and we put it up," Hamilton.
A coroner said Tuesday that Lauterbach died of blunt force trauma. Her burnt remains were found in a shallow grave in Laurean's back yard near Camp Lejeune, North Carolina.