Killer of Border Patrol agent gets life in prison

By Greg Moran
11:22 a.m., July 1, 2011

SAN DIEGO — A drug smuggler who ran down and killed a U.S. Border Patrol agent during a chase near the Imperial Sand Dunes Recreation Area more than three years ago was sentenced to life in prison Friday.

U.S. District Judge Michael Anello handed down the sentence to Jesus Navarro Montes, 25, in a courtroom packed with somber Border Patrol agents.

A federal court jury convicted Navarro on April 12 of second-degree murder. Prosecutors said he was at the wheel of a marijuana-laden Hummer H2 that ran down Border Patrol Agent Luis Aguilar on a frontage road off Interstate 8.

Aguilar, 32, was laying down a spike strip to try to stop the fleeing Navarro. Witnesses said Navarro swerved to avoid the strip, then slammed into Aguilar before speeding away and returning to Mexico.

Navarro was caught a few days later but released from Mexican custody two months later because U.S. authorities did not ask for his extradition in time. He remained at large until being arrested a second time in February 2009.

Aguilar was a married father of two girls.

Court records show that Navarro was a veteran “load driverâ€