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Former Northwestern professor Wyndham Lathem gets 53 years for murder of boyfriend Trenton James Cornell-Duranleau – CBS Chicago


CHICAGO (CBS) Former Northwestern University professor Wyndham Lathem was sentenced to 53 years in prison on Tuesday for what prosecutors called the 2017 murder of her boyfriend.

Lathem was found guilty of first degree murder in October last year in the 2017 stabbing of her boyfriend, James Cornell-Duranleau.

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Judge Charles Burns of Cook County Criminal Court sentenced Lathem on Tuesday.

Cornell-Duranleau’s murder is part of what prosecutors say is a sexual image that he shared with another man who is charged in the case.

Lathem is accused of stabbing Cornell-Duranleau – a 26-year-old hairstylist from Michigan – dozens of times in Lathem’s high-rise apartment building on State Street in River North.

Lathem, a prominent microbiologist, and Andrew Warren, an Oxford University financial officer, were arrested in California following an eight-day manhunt following the death of Cornell-Duranleau. Warren pleaded guilty in 2019.

During the trial, Lathem accused Warren of committing the crime while he crouched in a nearby bathroom.

A day after blaming Warren, who pleaded guilty to murder for his role in the murder, Lathem under questioning from prosecutors admitted that not only did he not try to stop Warren from killing her boyfriend. but also take a bath. before the two run away together.

From the stands, witnesses said he was shocked and believed authorities would blame him for killing Cornell-Duranleau. But he admits he has plenty of opportunities to tell someone what happened, starting with the doorman at his apartment building.

Nor did he tell any of the people he crossed the street, he said, after he and Warren fled Chicago before the two were arrested eight days later in Northern California after leading authorities a nationwide manhunt.

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Lathem later testified that Warren single-handedly stabbed Cornell-Duranleau during the beginning of a methamphetamine-using sexual encounter involving three men.

“I didn’t stop Andrew from hurting him,” Lathem testified. “I hid in the bathroom like a coward.”

That contradicts previous testimony in the trial of Warren, who in 2019 pleaded guilty to first-degree murder as part of a plea agreement that called for him to testify against Lathem in exchange for a sentence. 45 years in prison.

Warren, an Oxford University financial officer at the time of the murder, testified that he flew from England to Chicago to meet Lathem and enter into a killing pact before agreeing to kill Cornell- Duranleau, 26 years old. as suggested by Lathem.

Trenton James Cornell-Duranleau (Family photo)

He testified that he had, in fact, stabbed Cornell-Duranleau, but only after Lathem began stabbing him.

Lathem’s testimony at the trial also contradicted what he said on a video linked to an email he sent to his parents days after the murder.

“He trusted me completely and felt safe around me, and I betrayed that,” Lathem said on the video that the parents had turned to the US Marshals Service and played for the jury at the trial. The court tried him twice. “I took it all away when I killed him.”

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(© Copyright 2022 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All rights reserved. Associated Press contributed to this report.)



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