TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) — Two boys, both 13, have been arrested in connection with the killing of a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent in an apparent bungled robbery attempt, Honduran Security Minister Oscar Alvarez announced Sunday.
DEA Special Agent Timothy Markey was shot to death on Friday while on vacation visiting a popular Roman Catholic shrine in Tegucigalpa.
FBI and DEA agents helped Honduran authorities track down the two suspects, who police describe as seasoned gang members.
The jailed suspects were identified as Erlan Colindres, who has escaped three times from correctional centers, and his bodyguard Manuel Romero.
«They are dangerous offenders, despite their young ages,» said Alvarez at a news conference.
Honduran authorities are struggling to combat high rates of violent crime, much of it involving ruthless youth gangs, known as «maras,» concentrated in urban areas.
The Mara Salvatrucha and rival Mara 18 have about 100,000 members and control poor neighborhoods in Honduras’ principal cities using violence, threats and extortion.
President Ricardo Maduro, whose own son was kidnapped and killed in 1997, took office in 2002 promising to eliminate such gangs, but the groups have proven to be resilient.
On a two-day break in the Honduran capital, Markey took a cab from his hotel to visit the Basilica of Suyapa, a shrine to the country’s patron saint, where he was confronted by two assailants, according to testimony from his taxi driver.
Shot twice, Markey was rushed to a nearby public hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
Police tracked the suspects down in the Nueva Suyapa neighborhood on the eastern outskirts of the capital.
Colindres had taken refuge in a gang house nicknamed «Little Hell» by neighbors, authorities said.
Police found a gun buried under the dirt floor of the residence.
Markey began his DEA service in September 1989 and was assigned to the General Watch Unit at the El Paso Intelligence Center in El Paso, Texas, at the time of his death.
Honduran authorities said the U.S. agent had been training Honduran police involved in drug interdiction efforts.
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