THE BURNED OVER DISTRICT

Despite the hopes of many that he would spend the rest of his days in a Mexican jail, Ethan Couch has been returned to the US. It remains to be seen how he will be treated, as a juvenile or as an adult as he is now 18.

Mr. Couch, whose affluenza defense helped him avoid prison for a drunken-driving crash that killed four people in 2013, decided this week to drop his appeal in Mexico against deportation back to the United States.

Early on Thursday, Mexican immigration authorities confirmed that he was on his way to the airport, The Associated Press reported. Local media in Texas later covered his arrival at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport, escorted by federal marshals.

He was later booked into a juvenile facility in Fort Worth, where he will be held overnight until a detention hearing, expected on Friday, Samantha K. Jordan, a spokeswoman with the district attorney’s office, said in an emailed statement.

At the hearing, the judge will decide whether to release him and put him back on probation, to hold him at the juvenile facility or to send him to the Tarrant County jail until Feb. 19, when a decision will be made on the request to transfer his case to adult court, said Sheriff Dee Anderson.

Mr. Couch’s controversial defense stirred debate over how wealthy, white defendants are treated in court. He was given probation after killing four people while driving drunk, after an expert witness testified that the teenager suffered from “affluenza,” a psychological condition stemming from his family’s wealth.

But in November last year, the Tarrant County district attorney’s office asked that his case be transferred from juvenile court to adult court, which could impose stricter probation terms. And in December, prosecutors began looking into whether Mr. Couch had violated his probation after a six-second video posted on Twitter appeared to show Mr. Couch at a drinking party with other youths.

Hopwfully his flight to Mexico will get him treated as an adult and allow his to be penalized accordingly.