AP News, March 7th, 2007
A Mexican national surrendered at the U.S. border Wednesday on allegations of abducting a 13-year-old from a Florida bus stop last month and leaving him tied up in the woods before the boy escaped, officials said.
Vicente Ignacio Beltran-Moreno, 22, agreed to voluntarily return from Mexico after several days of negotiations with the FBI, Manatee County Sheriff Charlie Wells said.
Beltran-Moreno was arrested Wednesday morning at the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas, and extradition proceedings were under way to get him back to Florida.
"We pretty much told him we weren't going to give up," sheriff's Maj. Connie Shingledecker said.
They convinced him he would be better off in a U.S. prison, close to his girlfriend and two children, than incarcerated in Mexico, she said.
Clay Moore was grabbed Feb. 23 while waiting at his school bus stop in Parrish. The gunman drove off with him in a red pickup truck, then left him tied up in the woods about 20 miles away.
The boy's parents have said he freed himself by using a safety pin to pick apart the duct tape that held his wrists.
Beltran-Moreno became a suspect after investigators took an artist's sketch to migrant worker camps east of Bradenton.
Investigators have said they believe that Clay was picked out at random and that the kidnapper planned to leave him tied up in the woods until a ransom was paid.
Clay was in school taking a standardized test Wednesday. His stepfather, Steve Kelle, said the boy's family was pleased with the arrest.
"We're just overjoyed and we're glad we can get past this," he said.
