Where Is La’Rene Austin Now? Inside Her Life After Murdering Her ‘Best Friend’ and Framing the Victim’s Boyfriend

La’Rene Austin appeared to be a distraught friend when she rushed to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department in blood-soaked clothes and told officers that she had found her “best friend,” LaNell Barsock, dead.

Austin — whose case was featured on the Jan. 23 episode of Dateline — quickly told authorities that Barsock’s boyfriend, Louis Bonheur, was to blame. She alleged that Barsock and Bonheur had gotten into a fight over Barsock’s infidelity. Austin claimed that after he killed Barsock, Bonheur saw her and chased her in his car, per Oxygen.

Police arrested Bonheur in connection with Barsock’s murder; however, after investigating his alibi, they realized that he had been nowhere near the crime scene. The case took a shocking twist when police continued digging into Barsock’s life and learned that she had a brief romantic relationship with Austin — whom she had actually known for just a few weeks. They soon realized Austin was the actual killer, finding her DNA at the crime scene and messages that showed Barsock ending their tryst.

Before detectives could arrest her, Austin fled the country; she was later found in Belize after she was featured on America’s Most Wanted, according to the District Attorney of Los Angeles County.

Here’s everything to know about where La’Rene Austin is now after killing LaNell Barsock and framing Louis Bonheur.

Who is La’Rene Austin?

Austin was living in Palmdale, Calif., in 2010, allegedly in debt and struggling to hold down a job. Around that time, she took out a personals ad on Craigslist through which she met Barsock.

“They met through Craigslist. La’Rene had put an ad in the personals section, women seeking women, and LaNell answered that ad and they developed a friendship which turned into a romantic relationship,” Detective Joe Espino told Dateline.

Espino further claimed on Crime Watch Daily that Austin “was involved with six other women through Craigslist.” However, she was reportedly most interested in Barsock and wanted a future with her.

“La’Rene befriended her, they developed a romantic relationship. [She] was hoping to move in with her and be happy forever after,” said Espino.

Los Angeles Detective Robert Kenney added, “When she hooked up with Lanell, she thought ‘My ticket is here. I’m going to get what I want and what I deserve.’ “

Who was LaNell Barsock and what happened to her?

Barsock was a 29-year-old nurse who worked at a health center in Los Angeles, per Dateline.

“She was very successful, attractive. A licensed vocational nurse,” Espino said on Crime Watch Daily. “She lived in a beautiful home, 3,700 square feet.” Barsock’s close friend Marcel Fomotar said on Dateline that she helped him adjust to living in the U.S. after he immigrated from Cameroon. He called Barsock his “guardian angel here in America.”

In her personal life, Barsock was in a relationship with Louis Bonheuer, who immigrated from Haiti. They met at school and started dating, but their relationship was reportedly fractured over financial issues, infidelity and heated tempers.

“There was a dark side that people didn’t know about Louis and that was that he was a very jealous and controlling individual,” Espino claimed, while adding that there were also reports of past domestic disturbances and stalkings.

Detectives also discovered that Bonheur knew Barsock had been unfaithful with a man named Ike Umuna. On the evening of June 16, 2010, Austin rushed into the LAPD Palmdale station while covered in blood and claimed that she found Barsock’s bloodied body in her garage. Upon arriving to Barsock’s home, detectives found the nurse shot once in the head with a black plastic bag over her head.

They later determined that Barsock had been shot in her living room by someone who used a pillow to quiet the blow. The killer then dragged Barsock’s body to the garage and placed a bloody rug in her car.

“The victim was having her hair weaved and the suspect was standing behind her,” Kenney claimed on Crime Watch Daily. “The suspect reached over grabbed a pillow … put the gun up to the pillow and shot her once in the back of the head.”

How did Austin set up Bonheur?

When Austin rushed to the sheriff’s office, she immediately told officers that Bonheur was the killer. She claimed that she saw Bonheur at the scene of the crime and alleged that he had chased her in his car all the way to the sheriff’s office.

In addition to Austin’s story, police further began to suspect Bonheur after they found a handwritten note that appeared to show Barsock leaving Bonheur for Umuna.

“Dear Louis, I am leaving you for Ike he makes more money so you can do whatever you want to do with the house I am moving out of state with Ike,” the note read in part. “I have been sleeping with him for four months now..good luck in life.”

Within hours of finding Barsock’s body, police tracked down Bonheur at Barsock’s mom’s home, where he claimed he had been for most of the evening. After learning of his girlfriend’s death, he vehemently denied having anything to do with it.

“That’s not me. That’s not me. That’s not me,” he emotionally told police. “Why they do that to her? Oh, my God.”

While he admitted to getting into a heated argument with Barsock earlier in the day over her infidelity, he maintained that he had been shopping at auto supply stores before arriving at Barsock’s mom’s home.

Despite his pleas, Bonheur was arrested in connection to Barsock’s death and was placed in jail for over a month. As time went on, though, police discovered that there was more to the story. “The lights start to go on that we’re heading in the wrong direction,” Kenney said on Dateline.

How was Austin eventually caught?

The case against Bonheur quickly started to fall apart when police obtained surveillance footage from auto parts stores that fully corroborated his alibi. At the same time, they were struggling to confirm Austin’s claims that she’d been in a park for several hours at the time of the murder.

Upon looking into Austin’s story, they also realized that she had lied about being childhood friends with Barsock and learned that they had actually met through Craigslist just a few weeks prior. Investigators obtained messages that showed the two had developed a brief romantic relationship, but Barsock had ended it shortly before her death.

“It was very apparent that La’Rene had far stronger feelings for LaNell than I think LaNell even knew,” prosecutor Jason Quirino told Dateline.

In addition to the revelation that Barsock had put an end to their romantic relationship, there was also physical evidence linking Austin to the murder. Police found her DNA and one fingerprint at the crime scene and later learned that Austin owned the same type of gun that was used to kill Barsock.

Police theorized that Austin had planned her future with Barsock and hoped to take over her life after her death.

“She absolutely saw LaNell Barsock as someone who could take her out of that and give her a better life and was infatuated with that and really, really wanted that and when it was taken away from her very quickly, in an instant, she ultimately lashed out and decided to kill LaNell as punishment for it,” Quirino claimed.

However, by the time police put all the pieces together, Austin had fled L.A. It wasn’t until an episode of America’s Most Wanted featuring the case aired that Austin was finally apprehended.

She was discovered in Belize and was taken into custody without incident on Jan. 25, 2012, according to the FBI. She was extradited to the U.S. later that day and was arrested for the murder of Barsock.

Austin went to trial in 2015 and was found guilty of one count of first-degree murder and using a gun to kill Barsock. Later that month, she was sentenced to two consecutive 25-year-to-life prison terms, per the Los Angeles Times.

Where is Austin now?

Austin is serving her sentences at the California Institution for Women in Chino, Calif., per California inmate records.

She is eligible for parole in February 2032 and has a pending parole board consultation tentatively scheduled for February 2027.