The Region : Border Agent Arrested

Border Patrol Agent Martin Adam Nava, who escaped after being arrested for investigation of smuggling aliens, surrendered to U.S. marshals in San Diego. Nava, 27, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Mexico, had been with the Border Patrol for 16 months and had completed his probationary period when he was arrested June 25. Colleagues said they caught the off-duty agent driving a rented car across the border from Tijuana with an 18-year-old woman. Hours later, he escaped from an interrogation room at the Border Patrol’s Brown Field station. The woman was held as a material witness, and felony smuggling and escape charges were filed against Nava while he was a fugitive. A Border Patrol spokesman said he is in custody at the federal Metropolitan Correctional Center in downtown San Diego.