Suspect in 4 Southland Slayings Is Captured by Border Patrol

A man wanted in connection with four killings in San Bernardino and Los Angeles counties was arrested by the U.S. Border Patrol after an agent following footprints found him hiding in the bushes with three other people near the border fence at Tecate, U.S. authorities said Friday.

Alfred Flores, listed as 22 years old by the Border Patrol, was the subject of a manhunt after the fatal shootings of three teenagers, whose bodies were found in the Rialto area in San Bernardino County over a three-day period in March.

Flores, identified by authorities as a parolee and a member of an El Monte gang, was known to have gone to Mexico after the San Bernardino County killings. But Mexican authorities were reluctant to hand him over because of concerns he would face the death penalty, which is barred in Mexico.

Investigators in Rialto believe Flores was headed back to the United States in search of more victims. Several people who had come in contact with him in the past year have been in hiding, fearing they were next in line, said Rialto Police Sgt. Craig Crispin.

San Bernardino prosecutors say they will send Flores’ file to the FBI, which will determine if he should be classified as a serial killer.

“He’s just a bad guy,” Crispin said. “He is the devil. We’re much better off with him behind bars.”

Flores will be arraigned Monday on three charges of first-degree murder, said San Bernardino County Deputy Dist. Atty. Michael Ramos. Authorities said they also will file special-circumstance allegations based on the number of victims. That would allow them to seek the death penalty.

Flores is accused of killing Ricardo Torres, 15, Alexander Ayala, 17, and Jason Van Kleef, 18, during a three-day rampage in late March.

Van Kleef’s body was found next to a drainage ditch in Rialto. Torres and Ayala were discovered next to a dumpster in an unincorporated community nearby known as Lytle Creek. All had been shot once in the head, Crispin said.

Authorities said Flores befriended the three teenagers after moving to Rialto from Los Angeles County, where he was linked to a slaying in Maywood last November in a dispute over money, according to Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Sgt. Randy Seymour. Flores may have gone to San Bernardino because he knew Los Angeles authorities were looking for him, Seymour said.

San Bernardino County sheriff’s spokesman Chip Patterson said Flores is believed to have killed the three teenagers because they would not join his gang.

Border Patrol officials said Flores apparently jumped the border fence into the United States on Thursday afternoon in rural Tecate, about 30 miles east of San Diego. An agent followed footprints for half a mile before encountering the group hiding in thick brush, said Fernando Grijalva, a Border Patrol spokesman in San Diego.

Flores gave agents a false name and initially identified himself in Spanish as an undocumented immigrant from Mexico, Grijalva said. But during booking, agents were alerted after checking his fingerprints against a computerized database kept by the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, Grijalva said.

Subsequent checks revealed Flores was wanted by San Bernardino County authorities. He was handed over to San Bernardino sheriff’s detectives late Thursday night, Grijalva said.

The three undocumented immigrants arrested with Flores were booked and returned to Mexico. It was unclear how Flores happened to be traveling with them.

“He was pretty calm, tranquil. He wasn’t anything out of the ordinary,” Grijalva said. “If we didn’t have that [computer] system, I don’t think we would have suspected anything.”

The database hasn’t always been reliable in identifying fugitives. An uproar arose in 1999 after a drifter wanted for questioning in connection with four killings in Texas was thought to have killed again after being arrested by the INS and deported to Mexico because the computer records system did not indicate he was sought. The suspect, Angel Maturino Resendiz, surrendered to U.S. authorities and later was convicted and sentenced to death.

The incident spawned promises by the U.S. Justice Department to link the INS system with the FBI’s database, a process officials said could take five years.

Grijalva said Flores was listed in the INS database because of a previous arrest by the Border Patrol.