LAREDO, Texas (AP) - The Latest on the arrest of a U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent suspected of killing several women (all times local):
10 p.m.
A Texas prosecutor says a U.S. Border Patrol supervisor has been charged with four counts of murder following a two-week killing spree of female sex workers.
Webb County District Attorney Isidro Alaniz says in a tweet that Juan David Ortiz has also been charged with aggravated assault and unlawful restraint of a fifth woman who escaped from him and found a state trooper.
Ortiz is a 10-year veteran of the Border Patrol. He was arrested early Saturday after the woman escaped at a gas station and state troopers found him hiding in a truck in a hotel parking lot.
Alaniz says he is continuing to work with state and local law enforcement on the investigation of what he called “serial killings.” ___
8:25 p.m.
Webb County District Attorney Isidro Alaniz says he believes Border Patrol supervisor Juan David Ortiz has killed four women since Sept. 3, including one transgender woman.
Alaniz tells The Texas Tribune that two of the victims were U.S. citizens while the nationalities of the others are unknown. He says all of them were sex workers.
Authorities say Ortiz was arrested early Saturday after a woman he had abducted escaped and told law enforcement officers, who pursued him.
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4:50 p.m.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has offered condolences to family and friends of the victims of a border patrol agent suspected of killing several women.
Juan David Ortiz was arrested early Saturday and is expected to be charged in the deaths of four women, all of whom are believed to have worked as prostitutes.
CBP says in a statement that while it is the agency’s policy not to comment on an ongoing investigation, “criminal activity by our employees is not, and will not be tolerated.
None of the victims have been named. Ortiz was arrested after one woman he had abducted escaped and alerted authorities.
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3:20 p.m.
Webb County District Attorney Isidro Alaniz is describing the U.S. Border Patrol agent suspected of killing four women as a “serial killer.”
Alaniz says his office plans to charge Juan David Ortiz with four counts of murder and one count of aggravated kidnapping. Authorities say one woman Ortiz had abducted escaped early Saturday morning and she was able to alert authorities.
Webb County Sheriff Martin Cuellar says Ortiz fled from state troopers and was found hiding in a hotel parking lot in Laredo at around 2 a.m. Saturday.
Investigators are still trying to determine a motive for the killings.
Authorities didn’t disclose the victims’ names or nationalities but said they may have been prostitutes. They also declined to discuss the evidence or say how the women were killed.
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2:20 p.m.
Authorities say a U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent in Texas has been arrested on suspicion of having killed four women and abducted a fifth.
Webb County Sheriff Martin Cuellar said at a news conference that the agent, Juan David Ortiz, was arrested early Saturday morning.
The county’s district attorney, Isidro Alaniz, says authorities were led to Ortiz after a woman he tried to kidnap escaped from him. Ortiz fled from state troopers and hid in the parking lot of a Laredo hotel, where he was arrested.
Alaniz says authorities are still trying to determine a motive for the killings. He says all the women worked as prostitutes.
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