The lead suspect in the January 5 shooting of a consular officer from the U.S. Consulate General in Guadalajara is back in the United States after being expelled from Mexico.
Officers from the federal Attorney General’s Office (PGR) delivered U.S. citizen Zia Zafar, 32, to FBI agents in Toluca on Monday. He was flown to Virginia, where a preliminary hearing is expected Tuesday.
Jorge Lara Rivera, a senior legal official at the PGR, said Zafar was expelled immediately from Mexico due to irregularities in his immigration status.
This is a common method of quickly deporting U.S. citizens who have fled to Mexico to escape the criminal justice system in their homeland.
It is unusual, however, for the procedure to be employed after a crime has been committed on Mexican territory by a foreign national.
Lara Rivera said that had Zafar’s immigration papers been in order, he would have faced the corresponding legal proceedings in Mexico.
According to federal authorities, Zafir first arrived in Guadalajara in 2012 to study medicine at the Universidad Autonoma de Guadalajara. His last entry was in November 2016.
Surveillance video taken at the Sania Mall on Avenida Vallarta shows Zafir firing a single round at consulate staffer Christopher Ashcroft as he left the complex’s car park driving a Honda Fit. The assailant was wearing a back wig and dark glasses.
Ashcroft was shot in the chest but is reported to be in stable condition in a private hospital.
Zafar was arrested early Saturday morning at his home in Colonia Providencia. U.S. authorities had earlier posted the surveillance footage from the mall on social media, and the FBI had promised a reward of $US20,000 for information leading to the arrest of the aggressor.
One report suggested Zafir was traced to his home after video footage showed him paying at a Starbucks in the Sania mall with a credit card.
Neither Mexican or U.S. authorities have commented on the motive for the attack.
In the wake of the incident, the U.S. Embassy issued a security message for U.S. citizens in the Guadalajara area: “As the investigation into the January 6 shooting of the U.S. Consulate employee continues, U.S citizens in the Guadalajara area are urged to restrict their movements outside their homes and places of work to those truly essential … They should also take care not to fall into predictable patterns for those movements that are essential. They should vary the times and routes of their movements.”
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry praised Mexico for acting quickly to arrest the suspect.
“On behalf of President Obama and the people of the United States, I want to thank the government of Mexico for their swift and decisive arrest of a suspect in the heinous attack against our Foreign Service Officer colleague,’’ Kerry said. ‘‘My thoughts and prayers remain with this officer and his family during this difficult time. I wish him a speedy recovery.”