Los Angeles, California - A man wanted for his alleged involvement in the 2017 murder of a south Los Angeles woman was deported from Mexico to Los Angeles Saturday evening, announced Kristi K. Johnson, the assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office, Chief Michel Moore of the Los Angeles Police Department, and Joseph Gonzalez, the FBI’s Legal Attache in Mexico City.
In 2019, the FBI’s Fugitive Task Force, in conjunction with the Los Angeles Police Department, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, and law enforcement counterparts in Mexico, publicized one dozen fugitives who had allegedly committed crimes in Los Angeles and then fled Los Angeles County; many are believed to have fled to Mexico. Andres Zambrano was among the cases publicized last year and was arrested yesterday in Colima, Mexico.
Andres Zambrano, believed to be 30 years old, was wanted for his alleged involvement in the murder of the mother of his (then) 2-year-old child. On March 16, 2017, Zambrano allegedly shot the victim in the street in front of her home in Los Angeles, California. The fugitive poster of Zambrano can be found here. https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/murders/andres-zambrano
Based on an investigation by the Los Angeles Police Department, Zambrano was charged in the Superior Court of California, County of Los Angeles, with murder. A state warrant was issued for his arrest on March 20, 2017.
LAPD detectives assigned to the case identified Zambrano as a suspect following the murder and determined that he fled the state of California. Investigators and prosecutors then enlisted the assistance of the FBI’s Fugitive Task Force to locate and apprehend Zambrano. A federal arrest warrant was issued by the United States District Court for the Central District of California, Los Angeles, on March 31, 2017, after Zambrano was charged federally with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution (UFAP).
Agents and detectives on the Los Angeles task force who were investigating the case developed information that led to Zambrano’s location and provided it to Mexican officials in the area of Colima, Mexico. Zambrano was arrested without incident while eating at a restaurant on the evening of Friday, December 11, 2020.
Following the return to the United States, Zambrano was turned over to the custody of the LAPD and booked into state custody to await prosecution by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office. The United States government is expected to dismiss the federal warrant charging Zambrano with UFAP.
The fugitive investigation, arrest, and deportation of Zambrano was a coordinated effort among multiple law enforcement agencies in the United States and Mexico, to include the Colima State Police (Secretaría de Seguridad Publica) and the Secretariat of National Defense (SEDENA, Secretaría de la Defensa Nacional), with support from the FBI’s Legal Attache in Mexico City, its Guadalajara Regional Office, and members of the Operation Call Back (OCB) Team. The Colima Office of the National Immigration Institute (Instituto Nacional de Migración) deported Zambrano from Manzanillo, Colima, to Los Angeles, California.
The return of Zambrano was sponsored by the United States government’s “Project Welcome Home,” which provides funding for the transportation of FBI fugitives to the United States, where the repatriation by the host country occurs through deportation or extradition The FBI continues to work with local law enforcement as well as counterparts in other countries to apprehend violent criminals charged with state crimes who then flee the jurisdiction interstate or internationally.
