Sheriff’s Investigators believe a pregnant Marine spouse, missing since June 29th, may have been shot while hunting with an ex-Marine with whom she was having an affair. Erin Corwin, 20, planned to meet with neighbor, Christopher Brandon Lee, 24, to spend a quote – “special day together” on a hunting trip, according to documents filed in a Joshua Tree courthouse. Stories on the Desert Sun newspaper website yesterday, which we cite with permission, described a connection between Lee and Corwin. Also Monday, the Sheriff’s Department issued a release that Lee had been arrested July 4 after a “destructive device” had turned up in a search of a residence in the 700 Block of Geronimo in Yucca Valley, near the White Rock Horse Rescue Ranch, where both Lee and Corwin had worked. Lee was released on bail July 6. Yesterday’s release indicated that detectives attached to the search worked in the homicide department. The Desert Sun story said Sheriff’s spokeswoman Jodi Miller would not say if Lee’s arrest was related to the search for Corwin. However, when asked for an update on the search for the missing woman, Miller’s first response was to mention the arrest of Lee. When pressed, Miller said Lee was arrested as a result of a search warrant in “an ongoing investigation.” She repeatedly refused to say if that was the investigation of Corwin’s disappearance. Lee told detectives he was not with Corwin on the day she disappeared, but confirmed he went hunting in Joshua Tree National Park. The Desert Sun also reported that a friend said Lee moved to Alaska last week. Authorities have been searching for Erin Corwin since June 29, the day following her disappearance.
The full text of Desert Sun stories about these developments can be found at links in this story at z1077fm.com.
http://www.wbir.com/story/news/2014/07/21/ex-marine-who-knew-erin-corwin-arrested/12975351/
