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Homicide Suspect Arrested in Mexico

updated: Nov 02, 2011, 9:08 AM
Santa Barbara Police Department

In May of 1984, Miguel Godoy Morales committed a homicide on the 500 block of Olive Street. Godoy stabbed Antonio Pineda to death during a brawl that had initiated at a nearby bar. After committing the homicide, Godoy fled to Mexico in order to avoid arrest and prosecution.

In 2004, Detectives from the Santa Barbara Police Department traveled to San Diego in order to meet with agents from the California Department of Justice (DOJ), Bureau of Investigation and Intelligence, Foreign Prosecution and Law Enforcement Unit (FPLEU). The purpose of the meeting was to file an Article 4 case against Godoy for the homicide he had committed in Santa Barbara, Ca. An Article 4 gives the Mexican authorities the legal right to arrest and prosecute Godoy in Mexico for the homicide committed in Santa Barbara. Detectives from Santa Barbara Police Department and Agents from the Department of Justice subsequently flew to Mexico City, Mexico and met with the office of Procuraduria General De La Republica (PGR) which accepted the Article 4 case. An arrest warrant for homicide committed in a foreign country was issued by a federal judge in Mexico ordering Godoy's arrest.

Santa Barbara Detectives, Agents from FPLEU, PGR, and authorities from the City of Tijuana spent several years attempting to locate Godoy with no avail. On the evening of October 12th, 2011, twenty -seven years later, agents from the Baja California Norte, Policia Estatal Preventiva (PEP) , were conducting surveillance in the area near Godoy's last known address in Tijuana. PEP located Godoy working on a disabled vehicle in a commercial parking lot near his residence. Godoy was arrested without incident and flown to Mexico City for detention. Godoy is now awaiting trial for the homicide he committed in Santa Barbara on May 27th, 1984.



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Better late than never.

I do wonder how the Article 4 thing works to prosecute a murder in Mexico when the crime occurred in the USA? How or even what evidence will be presented???

WOW, ya think they had enough folks at the meeting and/or meetings in San Diego...

Bet the per diem and travel for all agencies must have been a pretty big number ...

Good to see how smooth this all works... even if it did take a long time and one hell of a lot of people ...

Must say .... pretty good choice for location ... as, it could have been held in El Centro too ...