LINK to story

Authorities find suspects in border killings through Mexican jails, hospital
By MARINA MONTEMAYOR Associated Press Writer
March 20, 2005

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico- Three suspects wanted for years in the killings of women in this industrial border city have been tracked down after spending time in jails and a mental hospital, authorities said Sunday.

Nearly 350 women have been killed since 1993 in Ciudad Juarez, located across the U.S. border from El Paso, Texas, according to federal investigators. About 100 killings of those killings follow an eerily similar pattern in which slender, young women were sexually assaulted, strangled and dumped in the desert.

Martin Alberto Favila was arrested Friday in connection with the 1997 killing of Elisa Rivera Rodriguez, said Claudia Banuelos, representative of the Chihuahua state attorney general's office.

Authorities tracked down Favila after discovering he served time in a Mexico City jail until 2003 and had returned home after his release.

David Osuna Soto, wanted in connection with the 1999 killing of a woman who never was identified, also was arrested on Friday at a psychiatric hospital, Banuelos said. A magistrate reportedly had ordered that Osuna Soto be treated at the hospital.

Favila and Osuna Soto were being held Sunday in a state jail in Ciudad Juarez.

Meanwhile, a man wanted in connection with the 2002 killing of Natividad Monclova Moreno was located already behind bars in Chihuahua City this month.

Julian Marquez Rico has been held for the past two years in a state jail in the Chihuahua state capital on robbery charges. Prosecutors were preparing new charges in connection with the 2002 killing.

The three arrests come shortly after apparent breakthroughs in the investigations into two other killings in Juarez.

U.S. authorities on Wednesday arrested and deported Manuel Angel Rodriguez, whom Mexican authorities were pursuing in the killing of Patricia Montelongo.

Discovered March 12 on a back porch in Ciudad Juarez, Montelongo's body had been stabbed 25 times.

In February, Mexican authorities announced the arrest of one of two suspects wanted in connection with the killing of 17-year-old Maria Sagrario Gonzalez in 1998.