Suspect in JonBenet Case Is Set to Arrive in U.S.

No Charges Have Been Filed Against Karr, Who Is Returning to Home Soil for First Time in Years

The 41-year-old American teacher arrested in Bangkok last week as a suspect in the decade-old killing of JonBenet Ramsey is due to arrive in the United States this evening, escorted by U.S. law enforcement officials, according to Thailand's immigration police.

"The tickets for John Mark Karr's departure are ready," Thailand's immigration police chief, Lt. Gen. Suwat Tumrongsiskul, told reporters yesterday. A major Bangkok newspaper reported that Karr was to be repatriated on a Thai Airways flight that is scheduled to land in Los Angeles this evening.

Karr's transfer from a Thai deportation facility -- apparently to Boulder, Colo. -- comes five days after he became the first person arrested in connection with the 1996 strangling of the 6-year-old child-beauty-pageant winner in her Boulder home.

The Boulder sheriff's office declined to discuss Karr's return yesterday. The office previously issued a statement saying that its duties in the case would include prisoner transport.

A spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the agency responsible for transporting detainees, said it has a policy of not disclosing such travel.

No charges have been filed against Karr, who told reporters in Thailand that he had been with JonBenet when she died. The Boulder County district attorney said last week that the investigation was at an early stage.

Karr's arrival will be his first known return to the United States since late 2001 after years in which he had said in résumés on Web sites that he traveled in Europe and Asia, holding a string of teaching jobs. He had been awaiting trial five years ago on misdemeanor charges of child pornography in Sonoma County, Calif., when he skipped a court appearance and disappeared from police and his family.

Michael L. Rains, an attorney for one of Karr's former wives, Lara Knutson, said in an interview Friday that she and their three teenage sons have had "no contact for years and no financial support." Knutson was married to Karr when he was arrested on the earlier charges.

As Karr was about to leave Thailand, a Bangkok clinic that specializes in transgender hormone treatments and surgery confirmed that the suspect had been a patient. Karr's treatment at Pratunam Poly Clinic was first reported by the New York Daily News.

Reached last night, a man at the clinic who identified himself as a doctor but would not give his name, said that Thai police had found a "patient card" from the clinic during a search of Karr's apartment. He said the card contained "the phone number of our clinic and diagnosis of Mr. Karr," as well as appointment dates.

The doctor said that he could not ethically disclose information about a clinic patient, including the nature of the treatment, but he added: "The police know everything."

In e-mail correspondence between Karr and a University of Colorado journalism professor, Michael Tracey, obtained last week by the Rocky Mountain News, Tracey at one point wrote to Karr: "You told me once that your mother tended to raise you as a girl. This must have had a powerful effect on your developing sexuality -- confusion maybe?"