BajaNomad

Fugitive on FBI most wanted list seized in TJ

BajaNews - 2-28-2006 at 12:10 AM

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/US/02/27/fugitive.mexico.ap/

Suspect in battered child's death captured in Mexico

February 28, 2006

NASHVILLE, Tennessee (AP) -- A fugitive on the FBI's 10 most wanted list has been arrested in Mexico on homicide charges more than three years after his girlfriend's son died of child abuse, authorities said.

Genero Espinosa Dorantes, 35, was taken into custody Saturday in the border city of Tijuana in Baja California, Mexico, FBI and Nashville police said at a news conference. He had been on the most wanted list since August 14, 2003.

The child's mother, Martha Patlan, agreed to cooperate with police and was taken into custody February 20 in Dolores Hidalgo, Mexico.

The two have been sought on criminal homicide charges since the body of her son, 4-year-old Luis Osvaldo Cisneros, was found dumped in a Nashville park on February 23, 2003.

The child's autopsy showed he suffered from battered child syndrome, was scalded, suffered infected burns from the waist down and had internal head injuries.

Nashville police detective Brad Corcoran said Monday the two have been in Mexico since the investigation started in 2003. He said they believe the two were together most of the time but had separated a few weeks before the arrests.

Corcoran said that although Patlan cooperated with police, she is still facing charges with Dorantes of first-degree murder and aggravated child abuse.

The two suspects are now awaiting extradition proceedings in Mexico, authorities said.

When the couple fled Nashville, an alert was issued because it was believed that they had two children with them -- Luis' older sister, Mariana Cisneros, and his younger half brother, Edgar A. Espinosa.

Both children, now ages 11 and 4, were found in Mexico and are being cared for by others, officials said.

Corcoran said he believed Dorantes was smuggling illegal immigrants into Tennessee at the time of the murder.