Post by Scumhunter on Mar 21, 2017 3:02:54 GMT -5
(Above photo credit: Algonquin Patch)
From the Chicago Tribune website:
In the quiet McHenry County farmland outside Harvard, Roberto Valdez-Calixto spent a February 2005 afternoon playing pickup basketball with a dozen friends, almost all of them immigrants from Texcapilla, a small corn- and potato-farming town two hours south of Mexico City.
The game became contentious. Afterward, while the men were drinking beers at one of their houses, a fight broke out. Valdez-Calixto allegedly stabbed Cecilio Hernandez to death. One of the men cradled Hernandez as he took his last breath.
Charged with murder and mob action, Valdez-Calixto fled. A subsequent Harvard police investigation revealed that Valdez-Calixto fled to Texcapilla, and fixed his location there in 2008. But he remains at large.
Three male relatives of Valdez-Calixto were involved in the fight — one was convicted of mob action and two others were convicted of second-degree murder.
Charged with murder and mob action, Valdez-Calixto fled. A subsequent Harvard police investigation revealed that Valdez-Calixto fled to Texcapilla, and fixed his location there in 2008. But he remains at large.
Three male relatives of Valdez-Calixto were involved in the fight — one was convicted of mob action and two others were convicted of second-degree murder.
Harvard police Chief Dan Kazy-Garey said his officers forwarded information about Valdez-Calixto's whereabouts in Mexico to U.S. federal officials in 2006, but today, "that's where it stands. Of course it's frustrating that one of the suspects has not been located. The fellow's still on the lam. We want the apprehension of the suspect, and it's always frustrating when we don't get it."
During a recent trip to Mexico, Tribune reporters found Valdez-Calixto on a family farm on a hillside outside of Texcapilla where he has lived for several years with his wife and three children. He works as a laborer and auto mechanic, said his wife, Araceli Ayala. She added that authorities had come looking for him right after he fled, but "to protect him, I didn't give them any information."
Despite the pending murder charge against Valdez-Calixto — and despite the fact that authorities in Illinois call him the "ringleader" in the slaying of Cecilio Hernandez — an arrest warrant has not been issued for him in Mexico, the Tribune learned. One law enforcement source told the newspaper that the Justice Department's Office of International Affairs has not asked the Mexican government to turn over Valdez-Calixto because Justice officials are not confident that the case meets the Mexican legal standards of proof required for extradition.
www.chicagotribune.com/news/watchdog/ct-met-valdez-calixto-fugitives-profiles-20111029-story.html
Thoughts? Valdez-Calixto is currently listed as McHenry County's #1 Most Wanted fugitive, yet he's another fugitive in the Chicago Tribune's now infamous "fugitives from justice" series- which indicates the difficulties of extraditing fugitives in Mexico back to the U.S.- even when their general location is pretty much known. It's been six years since that article came out, so all we can do is hope for sightings and that something is worked out to send Valdez-Calixto back to face justice.
Admin Note #1: According to the McHenry County, Illinois Sheriff's Office website, anyone with information should contact:
McHenry County Sheriff's Office Fugitive Apprehension Unit at
(815) 334-4704
McHenry County Sheriff's Office at (815) 338-2144
Crime Stoppers at (800) 762-STOP (7867)
TipLine@co.mchenry.il.us
Admin Note #2: If you have any (news-related) updates on this case, please contact us here: amwfans.com/thread/1662/website-contact-form
