CHICAGO (AP) - A Chicago-area man suspected of taking part in the 2009 killing of a teenager who was beaten and shot before his body was set on fire was added Thursday to the FBI's 10 Most Wanted Fugitives list.
Luis Macedo was charged with first-degree murder in the slaying of 15-year-old Alex Arellano. Four others were quickly arrested and in 2013, a 19-year-old Chicago man was sentenced to 60 years in prison, becoming the latest of four suspects who were convicted and sentenced to lengthy prison terms.
FBI Director James Comey said at a news conference Thursday that Macedo is the 507th person on the list, and 475 have been caught.
"We are trying to shine a very bright, very hot light on Macedo," Comey said.
He added the reward for information leading to his capture could be up to $100,000. Though Macedo hasn't been seen in years, authorities believe he is somewhere in the southeastern United States or Mexico.
Macedo, 28, of suburban Oak Lawn, replaces Brenda Delgado on the list. Delgado was wanted for the killing of her ex-boyfriend's new girlfriend in Texas and arrested in Mexico last month. Delgado faces charges of capital murder and unlawful flight to avoid prosecution in connection with the September death of Dr. Kendra Hatcher, a dentist.
In the Chicago case Macedo is being sought in, Arellano was killed on July 1, 2009, after he had gone to a neighborhood miles from where he lived in the hopes of meeting girls he'd communicated with online, media accounts at the time said. As he walked down the street on his way to a friend's house with three girls, he was confronted by members of the Latin Kings street gang. They demanded he give the gang's sign. But the teenager said he was not a member of the gang and even lifted up his shirt to show them that he had no gang tattoos, authorities said at the time.
His attackers beat him with baseball bats and then chased him into an unoccupied home after he ran away. There, they shot him in the head and set him on fire, prosecutors have said.
Just last month, the Chicago office of the FBI announced it was offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of Macedo. At the time, the FBI said Macedo had ties to both the Chicago area and Florida.
James Earl Ray, Osama bin Laden on past 10 Most Wanted lists
CHICAGO (AP) - The FBI had hunted dangerous fugitives for years when a United Press International reporter asked in 1949 for the names of the "toughest guys" to catch. The subsequent story about the 10 most dangerous fugitives was such a sensation that FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, understanding a publicity opportunity when he saw one, made the list permanent the next year.
The list has been populated by bank robbers, killers, kidnappers, drug traffickers, terrorists and others - many whose names were known around the country and the world, and others who were little known beyond the city limits where their crimes were committed. Some weren't captured for years, while one guy was on the list for all of two hours before he was captured.
Thomas Holden was the first of more than 400 men - there have been just a few women - to be captured after making the list. Holden had killed his wife and her two brothers in Chicago. He made it all the way to Oregon, where he was unlucky enough to be recognized from a photograph in a local newspaper.
Among the most well-known names to make the list over the years:
James Earl Ray: Ray was added to the list after he shot and killed the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. as the civil rights leader stood on a balcony at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. He was captured two months later in London.
Ted Bundy: One of the most notorious serial killers in American history, Bundy is believed to have killed at least 30 young women across the United States in the 1970s.
Osama bin Laden: Bin Laden was on the list as Usama bin Laden before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks - put there for his role in the 1998 deadly bombings of U.S. embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. When he was killed in 2011, the FBI updated the list to include a large, red and white "deceased" label over his photograph.
Ramzi Ahmed Yousef: The mastermind of the first World Trade Center Bombing in 1993, Yousef became the 436th fugitive to be put on the list later that year. Arrested in Pakistan two years later, he was subsequently convicted and sentenced to life in prison without parole.
James "Whitey" Bulger: The notorious Boston gangster suspected in more than a dozen killings in the 1970s and 1980s, was on the run for 16 years when he was captured in 2011 in Santa Monica, California.
Eric Rudolph: Rudolph disappeared into the mountains of North Carolina after he set off a deadly bomb at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. For more than five years - all while being on the FBI list - he lived off the land until he was captured after being seen scavenging for food near a grocery store trash bin.