Suspect in Oregon deputy’s 2007 death arrested in Mexico

PORTLAND – A Mexican man who was charged in a crash that killed an Oregon sheriff’s deputy in 2007 and then mistakenly released 10 months ago has been arrested again, authorities said.

Oregon State Police said in a statement Sunday that it learned Alfredo de Jesus-Ascencio, 29, had been caught in Mexico.

A grand jury had indicted him on charges of criminally negligent homicide more than a decade ago after a head-on collision that killed his 19-year-old passenger and Marion County Deputy Kelly Fredinburg.

De Jesus-Ascencio was critically injured but out of the hospital by the time a judge issued a warrant for his arrest.

He fled to Mexico and wasn’t caught until January 2017. He was mistakenly let go a month later due to an administrative error at the prison in Baja California.

Oregon State Police said de Jesus-Ascencio was arrested Thursday in Michoacan, a western Mexican state.

Oregon prosecutors in 2010 sought to have Mexican authorities prosecute him in their country because it was unlikely he would be extradited to the U.S.

Fredinburg, 33, was heading to an emergency call June 16, 2007, when his patrol car was struck by a Ford Crown Victoria that was traveling in the opposite direction and crossed the center line. The patrol car caught fire, and Fredinburg became the first Marion County deputy to die in the line of duty.

De Jesus-Ascencio’s passenger – a cousin – died from his injuries at a hospital.

Oregon State Police and the Marion County District Attorney’s Office worked jointly to find de Jesus-Ascencio with the FBI, U.S. Embassy, Interpol and the Mexican Attorney General’s Office.