Alleged killer’s extradition unlikely before June
By Robert Moore, Tribune Staff Writer

Unless Carmelo "Carmen" Vences moves up the court docket, he won’t return to Hamblen County to face a first-degree murder charge until June.

Vences, a 43-year-old Mexican national, allegedly shot his wife and the mother of his five children, Adelina Delasancha, 40 at a baptism party on Mother’s Day, according to Detective Sgt. Frank Lane with the Hamblen County Sheriff’s Department.

Vences’ initial appearance in Forsyth County (N.C.) Superior Court is currently scheduled for June 5, a court spokeswoman said this morning. It remains unclear whether the extradition hearing will occur at that time.

Extradition hearings do not involve guilt or innocence, only if the person who appears in court is the same individual who has been charged in another jurisdiction.

Vences remains incarcerated without bond at the Forsyth County Detention Center in Winston-Salem, N.C.

Lane, the lead investigator in the case, said this morning that he has approximately 10 eyewitnesses that identified Vences as the man who shot Delasancha to death at the party in a rented building on Spencer Hale Road.

Delasancha was talking to another man prior to the shooting. Vences allegedly pistol-whipped the man, and then pushed his wife to the floor and shot her between four and six times.

Lane says nothing in his investigation suggests that Delasancha and the man were anything more than casual friends.

Vences reportedly was staying with family members in Mt. Airy, N.C., near the Virginia border, when he was taken into custody by the U.S. Marshals Service on May 15, one day after Lane got a tip about the suspect’s location.

"It took a lot of hours with us the TBI and the U.S. Marshals to track him down," Lane said.

The marshals did not locate the alleged murder weapon, according to Lane.

Vences, who Lane says allegedly entered the United States illegally in 2001 or 2002, worked for a fire-protection manufacturing firm in Powell.

The detective says Vences doesn’t have a criminal history in Hamblen County, and he hasn’t yet received comprehensive report from federal law enforcement officials.

Local law enforcement officials have reported that it’s sometimes difficult to convince members of the Hamblen County Hispanic community to cooperate in a criminal investigation.

Lane says he encountered no such difficulty in this case.

"It was just cold," Lane said.

Vences and Delasancha have three adult children and two minor children. Lane says the oldest child, a 25-year-old man, is taking care of the minor children.

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