EDITOR’S NOTE: Our countdown of the Top 10 Stories of 2019 continues with story No. 4, as selected by the newsroom staff of the Tribune Chronicle and The Vindicator.

WARREN — Last January’s conviction of Claudia Hoerig, who murdered her husband, U.S. Air Force Major Karl Hoerig, in their Newton Falls home in 2007 and immediately left the country to escape prosecution, was a culmination of more than a dozen years of work.

Although the trial was swift, no more than nine days in length, it was rife with intrigue and suspense as Claudia Hoerig in testimony described a dysfunctional marriage and harrowing time spent in her birth nation of Brazil.

It is an odyssey that has not ended as Claudia Hoerig, 54, is appealing her 25-years-to-life sentence for the murder, plus three years for a gun specification, in the 11th District Court of Appeals and is set to appear in court on Jan. 29, 2020.

If she serves the entire sentence, the earliest Hoerig will be able to get out is when she is more than 80 years old.

Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins described the case as garnering local, national and international attention. It involved the work of the justice departments of three presidents — George W. Bush, Barrack Obama and Donald Trump — U.S. senators, members of the House of Representatives, as well as numerous law enforcement agencies and representatives of the Brazilian government.

The Brazilian government did not want to send Hoerig back to the U.S. if she could have faced the death penalty, Watkins said.

“They requested that I come to Brazil to have her tried in a Brazilian court under the Brazilian legal system,” Watkins said. “That was not going to happen. She murdered an American citizen in Trumbull County and we were going to prosecute her in Trumbull County.”

Watkins said based on her criminal history — which was nonexistent — there was little chance she would have received a death sentence.

“This case exemplifies that justice is a journey,” Watkins said. “We felt that justice would not be done until she was tried and convicted in a Trumbull County court in front of Major Hoerig’s family. We were able to accomplish that,” Watkins said. “Unfortunately it took so long.”

Watkins said the case could not have been prosecuted without the dedicated work of law enforcement, from the Newton Falls police to the U.S. Marshals service, the U.S. Justice Department, the media that kept the case alive, as well as local politicians, including U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan, D-Howland, who was active in the campaign to get her back into the country.

Watkins emphasized that people should not feel they can go to another county and find safe harbor for the murder of an American citizen.

He also said the prosecution of a more than 10-year-old murder case typically is very difficult because the passage of time often helps the defense.

“Memories of witnesses grow stale and they sometimes forget,” Watkins said. “Witnesses move and sometimes die.”

In this case, the original coroner who did the autopsy of Karl Hoerig had died. Using the records that were left, a substitute coroner testified.

It was Claudia Hoerig’s own words to U.S. Marshals as they traveled back to the United States and in interviews at the Trumbull County jail that aided in her conviction, Watkins said.

“We were able to poke holes in her story during the trial,” Watkins said. “We were able to prove that her story was patently false.”

Facing an appeal in January, Watkins is confident the conviction will be upheld.

“She had excellent representation,” Watkins said. “She had a fair trial. She was able to present expert witnesses.”