The FBI announced a $1 million reward for information leading to the arrests of four men wanted in the murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry. Until Monday, the government had kept quiet about the case since the agent was killed along the Mexican border in December 2010.
A federal judge also unsealed an 11-count indictment on Monday laying out the charges against six men charged in connection with Terry’s killing. Four are still fugitives. They ran off after the agent was shot.
James Turgal is the Special Agent in Charge of the FBI in Arizona.
“We will not stop and we will not rest until these fugitives from justice shown on these posters here today responsible for the murder of Brian Terry are located, apprehended and prosecuted," he said.
Three of the defendants named are brothers. They are Manuel, Rito and Heraclio Osorio-Arellanes. Only Manuel and Rito are in custody. Rito was arrested two days before Agent Terry was shot and was being held on illegal re-entry charges. Since then, he has also been charged with conspiracy. Manuel and the five others are all charged with murder. Jesus Rosario Favela-Astorga is the brothers' brother-in-law.
Officials declined to state where in Mexico the suspects may be, but said they are working with authorities there to arrest them. Court records show that two of the defendants hail from Sinaloa. When asked, Laura E. Duffy, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of California, called all six, “long-time associates.”
Duffy also said the government released the information after two attempts to arrest the suspects failed earlier this year.
“So following our most recent apprehension efforts in April and again in June, we believe that it’s in the best interests of the ongoing investigation to unseal the case at this point in time and to enlist the assistance of the general publics in both Mexico and the United States," she said.
Now, officials declined to discuss the connections between Terry’s murder and the scandalous gunwalking program known as Operation Fast and Furious. However, the newly disclosed court records show the only two guns ever found at the crime scene of the Terry murder came from Fast and Furious. One of those, the newly released records allege, was in the hands of Manuel Osorio-Arellanes.
