(Credit: Bienville District Sheriff's Office)

(CNN) –– Louisiana police have concluded a 32-year manhunt after they found a defendant in Mexico who fled his 1991 trial for attempted murder.

In a statement issued by the FBI's New Orleans branch, investigators said they received a tip that Greg Lawson, 63, was hiding in Mexico, something they suspected since efforts began to find him. Through a collaboration between agents in Shreveport, Los Angeles and Mexico, Lawson was arrested on September 19.

"There is no question that Mr. Lawson would remain at large if our partners in Mexico had not been willing to deal with this so quickly," Special Agent Douglas A. Williams Jr. said in the statement.

Lawson was initially arrested for shooting a man in the Bienville Parish district. He then fled the trial just before the jury announced its guilty verdict for attempted murder. According to Bienville District Sheriff John E. Ballance, Lawson was free on bond at the time and left during the lunch hour in court. He never returned.

After being found in Huatulco, Mexico, Lawson was arrested and deported from Mexico for immigration violations, according to the statement from the FBI in New Orleans. FBI officials have since returned him to Louisiana.

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According to Sheriff Ballance, Lawson is currently housed at the Claiborne District Detention Center.

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