Lara Tur: The Nettleton Affair, Trial, and Wrongful Death Suit

Lara Tur, now known as Lara Sabanosh, was the director of the Fleet and Family Support Center at Naval Station Guantanamo Bay and the wife of Christopher Tur, a civilian contractor whose drowning death in January 2015 became the center of a federal cover-up case against the base’s commanding officer. Her affair with that commander, Captain John R. Nettleton, set off the confrontation that preceded her husband’s death, and her own denials to investigators kept the affair hidden for months.¹

Who Lara Tur Was on the Base

Lara and Christopher Tur married in 1995 and had two daughters. The family moved to Guantanamo Bay around 2011 and lived in the Caribbean Circle neighborhood on the installation.² Christopher, a Marine Corps veteran from Hatfield Township, Pennsylvania, managed loss prevention for the base’s Navy Exchange facilities.³ Lara held the more senior role, counseling military and civilian families as director of the Fleet and Family Support Center.¹

The marriage was troubled. Lara later described Christopher as “jealous, controlling and abusive” and said she had been planning to divorce him.¹ She testified that Christopher had “problems with prescription drugs, alcohol and domestic violence” but that she never filed reports, because she did not want it to affect their careers or family life.⁴

The Affair With Captain Nettleton

Nettleton, a career Navy helicopter pilot, had commanded Naval Station Guantanamo Bay since June 2012.⁵ In 2014, he and Lara began a sexual relationship. She later acknowledged they had sexual relations while both attended a leadership meeting in Jacksonville, Florida, in late 2014, and she described it as a “one-time mistake by two friends that crossed a line.”⁴ She also acknowledged flirtation and kissing between them on the base.

The Night Christopher Tur Died

On the evening of January 9, 2015, both Turs attended a “Hail and Farewell” party at the Bayview Officers’ Club. During the event, Christopher confronted Lara about her relationship with Nettleton. She testified that Christopher “got physical with her” and then left the party.⁴

Christopher went to Nettleton’s official residence. Nettleton’s daughter reported hearing a loud commotion and arguing that lasted about 30 minutes.⁶ A physical fight followed. One of Christopher’s friends said Christopher called him afterward and said he had “just knocked the skipper out.”⁷

Christopher was never seen alive again. He was reported missing the next morning, and his body was found floating in the waters off the base on January 11, roughly 36 hours after the fight.⁸

What the Autopsy Showed

The autopsy ruled the cause of death drowning, but the examination also documented four broken ribs and a bruise or laceration to the forehead sustained before Christopher entered the water. Toxicology found “potentially lethal amounts of Prozac and alcohol” in his system.⁹ Investigators found Christopher’s blood inside the entryway of Nettleton’s residence and on a paper towel in the backyard; DNA testing confirmed it was his.⁶

A private autopsy commissioned by Lara concluded Christopher drowned “with recent blunt injuries.”¹⁰ No official determination was ever made about how he ended up in the water. Whether the death was a homicide, a suicide, or an accident has never been resolved. At Nettleton’s trial, U.S. District Judge Timothy J. Corrigan barred both sides from speculating on the point, telling the jury the case was “not a murder case” and “not a case either about whether he committed suicide.”⁹

Lara’s Denials to Investigators

Lara and Nettleton had what she called a “mutual” agreement to deny the affair. She held to that denial through multiple NCIS interviews, saying she did not believe the relationship was relevant to her husband’s death. She did not admit to the affair until October 2015, when she testified before a federal grand jury.¹¹

She was not criminally charged. Nettleton, by contrast, was indicted in January 2019 in the Middle District of Florida on ten counts tied to his cover-up: obstruction of justice, concealment of material facts, falsification of records, and making false statements. He was not charged with Christopher’s death itself.¹²

Her Testimony at Nettleton’s Trial

At Nettleton’s federal trial in January 2020, Lara — by then using the name Lara Sabanosh — testified for the prosecution. She said Nettleton never told her about the fight with her husband, even as he helped organize the search the next morning and behaved “normally.” She said she only learned of the altercation weeks later, when Nettleton called to warn her that the story was about to break in the media.¹¹ Had she known about the fight, she testified, she “would have answered differently” when investigators asked about the affair.¹

She also described the logic behind the pair’s initial denials. When she finally told Nettleton she had admitted the affair, she said, his response was simply “good.” Her own explanation for staying silent was blunt: “Without two people, now there was no affair.”¹¹

The jury convicted Nettleton on six of the ten counts on January 17, 2020. On October 8, 2020, Judge Corrigan sentenced him to 24 months in federal prison followed by one year of supervised release.⁸¹³

The Wrongful Death Lawsuit Against Her

In March 2021, while Nettleton was serving his prison sentence, Christopher Tur’s family filed a 57-page wrongful death lawsuit in Duval County court. The suit named three defendants: Nettleton, Lara Sabanosh, and Kelly Wirfel, the base’s former public affairs officer.¹⁴

The claims against Nettleton included wrongful death, survival, assault and battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress, failure to render aid, and tortious interference with a dead body. The suit alleged he intentionally or recklessly caused Christopher’s death by drowning him after the altercation, then cleaned the scene and destroyed evidence.¹⁴ These are civil allegations; Nettleton has never been criminally charged with causing the death.

The claim against Lara was intentional infliction of emotional distress, based on allegations that she covered up information relevant to her husband’s death.¹⁴ The family sought compensatory and punitive damages and requested a jury trial. As of the March 2021 reporting, none of the defendants had filed responses.¹⁵

Where Lara Sabanosh Is Now

Lara has retired from civil service and lives in Pensacola, Florida, with her family. She wrote a book titled Caged, in which she describes her experience with domestic abuse, and she has spoken publicly about what she calls a “broken system that desperately needs repair.”¹⁶

Christopher’s family has taken a very different view of what happened. His brother, Michael Tur, said the family was “troubled” that no one had been charged with homicide and called Christopher’s ending “terrible.” They commissioned the private autopsy, pushed for administrative punishment of Nettleton, and ultimately brought the wrongful death case.² How Christopher Tur ended up in the water that night remains, as prosecutors acknowledged at trial, a question the courtroom never answered.

1
Chicago Tribune. Sex, Power and Fury: The Mystery of a Death at Guantánamo Bay
2
The Morning Call. Arrest Made in Connection With Death of Montco Native at U.S. Navy Base in Cuba
3
Connell Falk Funeral Home. Christopher Tur Obituary
4
News4Jax. Sex, Lies, Lust at Center of Former Gitmo Commander’s Trial in Jacksonville
5
Navy Times. Ex-Guantanamo Commander Gets 2-Year Prison Sentence for Lying in Man’s Death
6
ABC News. Guantanamo Bay Commander Indicted for Obstructing Justice in 2015 Death
7
NBC San Diego. Ex-Guantanamo Commander Sentenced for Lying in Man’s Death
8
U.S. Department of Justice. Former Commander of Naval Station Guantanamo Bay Sentenced to Prison
9
Pulitzer Center. Sex, Power and Fury: The Mystery of a Death at Guantanamo Bay
10
The Philadelphia Inquirer. Death of Montco Man in Cuba Remains a Mystery
11
The Florida Times-Union. Daughter, Former Lover Testify in Federal Trial of Ex-Commander of Guantanamo Naval Base
12
McClatchy DC. Guantanamo Base Commander Charged With Obstructing Probe Into Worker’s Death
13
The New York Times. Guantanamo Bay Commander Sentenced
14
The Florida Times-Union. Lawsuit Filed in Jacksonville After Ex-Captain Starts Prison Sentence
15
News4Jax. Former Gitmo Commander Hit With Wrongful Death Lawsuit While in Prison
16
Amazon. Lara M. Sabanosh Author Page