Lauren Aljubouri and Eric Tavulares

UPDATE, January 30, 2009: Eric Tavulares Sentenced to 40 Years
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About Lauren Aljubouri:

Monday, one of Aljubouri’s favorite teachers remembered the promising, talented young artist. “We need more non-conformists like Lauren Aljubouri,” Arrowhead High School art teacher Matt Luebke said.

With a mentor’s pride, Luebke showed TODAY’S TMJ4 some of Aljubouri’s work, including the unfinished piece she was working on when she graduated, and an abstract self-portrait.

“She had it, she was very creative,” Luebke said.

Aljubouri planned to follow her passion at UWM’s Peck School of the Arts with aspirations of becoming a teacher herself. Anxious to move on, Aljubouri graduated Arrowhead High School in January, a semester early.

“She did it because she was done with high school. She learned what she needed to learn here and she was ready to go off into the world,” Luebke said.

Aljubouri's younger sister said Lauren looked at life with an artist’s eye. “She was very inspired by anything really that looks interesting. She’ll make her only little way on something,” Brittany Aljubouri said.

See some of Aljubouri's artwork in this video from TMJ4.

Here's more about Aljubouri:

Debbie Aljubouri said her daughter was independent, driven and intelligent, determined to pursue her passion for the arts at UWM.

Lauren Aljubouri had worked at Hartbrook Cafe in Hartland from the time she was 15 until June, painting a mural at the business just before she finished working there, her mother said. Lauren Aljubouri graduated early and with honors from her high school, she said.

Lauren Aljubouri handled her search for colleges on her own, telling her mother that all she needed to do was attend the registration session at UWM, Debbie Aljubouri said.

“There isn’t anything that girl couldn’t do, no matter what it was, and do it well,” Debbie Aljubouri said. “She just handled everything.”

Lauren Aljubouri moved into her apartment within the past few weeks, her mother said.

She had worked at Umami Moto, a Milwaukee restaurant, for about a month, said Omar Shaikh, an owner of the business.

“She was a wonderful girl, rather quiet, but a very dependable, hard worker,” Shaikh said. “She seemed like a young, happy girl.”

Sadly, the story of this talented young woman has an abrupt, horrific end.

Her family and her friends are dealing with a sudden, terrible loss.

Last night during a phone interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Aljubouri's mom sobbed and said, "We’re just absolutely devastated. She had so much promise in the future, and it’s such a tragic loss. "

She was strangled early on Saturday morning by her childhood sweetheart, Eric Tavulares.

Eric Tavulares was fascinated with the movie “Natural Born Killers.”

He told police he has seen it 10 or 20 times. He told police, according to a complaint filed Monday, that he had been watching it Friday night, the night he strangled his childhood sweetheart, 18-year-old Lauren Aljubouri.

According to the complaint:

Tavulares, also 18, told police he has had known Aljubouri since the second grade and that they had been dating on and off since the sixth grade.

Aljubouri, who graduated in January from Arrowhead High School in Waukesha County, got home around 10:45 p.m. Friday.

She and Tavulares lived in an apartment in the 2400 block of N. Frederick Ave., not far from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where Aljubouri planned to study graphic design. Tavulares planned to study fire science at Milwaukee Area Technical College.

Tavulares told police they began watching “Natural Born Killers,” a 1994 movie directed by Oliver Stone in which the murder spree of two psychopathic lovers becomes a media obsession.

They stopped the movie about halfway, Tavulares said, and went to bed.

“He stated he does not recall exactly what happened next,” the complaint says, “but something caused him to switch mentally and he rolled over on Lauren Aljubouri and he began strangling her.”

Within three or four minutes, Tavulares said, Aljubouri was dead.

The murder of Lauren Aljubouri has been reported by local media for the past three days.

However, it was when Natural Born Killers came into the reports that this local story became a fascination for the national media.

The local media, too, have altered their take.

Now the emphasis is on Tavulares and his obsession with that incredibly violent movie, loosely based on a screenplay by Quentin Tarantino and directed by Oliver Stone.

Since its release in 1994, it has been cited as playing a role in a number of real life murders. Supposedly, people watch it and then flip out and kill. Apparently, it's inspiring in that way.

So the death of Lauren Aljubouri becomes another murder linked to Natural Born Killers.

I'm not saying that the media shouldn't report the facts of the case. Tavulares is saying the movie influenced him. It is what it is.

The problem that I have with this national attention and the change in the local coverage is that it shifts the focus to the lore of that movie and off of the very human loss of a daughter and sister and niece and friend.

More on Lauren Aljubouri:

Described by her father, Faiek Aljubouri, as “beautiful, determined, creative and very independent,” Lauren was self-taught on the guitar, loved to write and flourished in art.

“She was quite talented,” said Tom Miller, Aljubouri’s uncle and godfather.

She recently completed a mural at Hartbrook Cafe. Her artwork also was featured on the covers of an AHS school curriculum guide and for a school play, her mother said.

“There wasn’t anything that girl couldn’t do and do so well,” Debbie Aljubouri said.

Aljubouri is remembered as hard working, earning enough credits to graduate from high school early in January, and then working at Hartbrook Cafe until moving into her apartment in preparation for school.

“Everything she told me she’d do, she did it,” her father said. He said as an immigrant, “we all have dreams when we come here – she was my dream.”

In a letter of recommendation for Aljubouri, Sarah Johansen, an English teacher at AHS, wrote, “Though I only had Lauren in class for one semester, she left an indelible impression. She’s a young woman of extraordinary confidence and charisma who is impossible to forget.”

“She was just a good kid,” said Miller.

Killer Tavulares isn't such a good kid.

The suspect is also a former Hartland resident, who is on probation for possessing illegally obtained prescription drugs. Under a plea agreement with prosecutors, the man entered a guilty plea to the misdemeanor charge while misdemeanor charges of possession of marijuana and drug paraphernalia as well as a felony charge of possession with intent to deliver were dismissed.

In September, the man was sentenced to two years’ probation and 60 days in jail for resisting/obstructing an officer. In June 2007, the man was arrested for underage drinking and fighting.

The Journal Sentinel reports that Tavulares has "convictions for resisting or obstructing an officer, possession of an illegally obtained prescription drug and bail jumping."

Tavulares told police that when he realized Lauren Aljubouri was dead, he jumped off her and attempted to resuscitate her.

A police officer arrived at their apartment shortly after 3 a.m. Saturday.

Tavulares answered the door.

“I did it,” he told the officer, according to the complaint.

“I can’t believe it. I did it,” he said.

The officer followed Tavulares into the kitchen. Without being questioned, according to the complaint, he again told the officer, “I killed her.”

TMJ4 reports:

The suspects' family isn't saying anything about Eric Tavulares. But they did have a brief message Monday for Lauren's family. "Our hearts are all broken," said Liz Tavulares.

Eric's sister read from a statement as she struggled to keep her composure. "Lauren was a beautiful woman who we all cared about and we will all miss her very much," Liz Tavulares said.

Eric's sister wants Lauren's family to know this; "From our entire family our deepest heartfelt sympathies our thoughts and our prayers are with Lauren and her family."

Tavulares' family is struggling, too. He has forced his family to bear an incredible burden.

Aljubouri's death is such a tragedy. So many people are hurting.

It shouldn't be fodder for tabloids and trash TV. Her murder isn't some instance of movie violence. For her family and friends, the loss is real and so great.

My heart goes out to her loved ones.