Anchorage police have wanted to get their hands on him for years. They last saw Ariel Beau Patrick on a day back in 2007 when they questioned him in a murder investigation, then let him walk because they didn't have enough evidence to charge him.

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David Anderson

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Jamaal Barras

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Ariel Patrick

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That same September night, he was on a plane to Guatemala. In following days, the investigation uncovered a surveillance video of the alley behind F Street Station downtown that police say shows Patrick and David Kenneth Anderson, 26, beating 20-year-old Jamaal Barras to death with a baseball bat and two mop handles.

Investigators charged Patrick, 25, with murder. But he was long gone.

"It was frustrating. We didn't have the video, of course, at that time, and he was denying involvement," homicide Detective John Foraker said. "We didn't have any reason to hold him at that time. It's unfortunate that he fled that night, but he was able to hide for a couple of years, and it finally caught up to him."

The case generated interest from "America's Most Wanted," which aired appeals for information on the case twice in 2008. Investigators say information from that show and other sources led them to a low-income neighborhood of Guatemala City, where Patrick, a U.S. citizen, was arrested this week.

"Well, the long arm of the law," Barras' adoptive brother, Kevin Barras, said Wednesday upon learning of Patrick's capture. "They got him in a foreign country."

Patrick, who was in Guatemala illegally, was deported to the U.S., where U.S. marshals arrested him Wednesday on charges of first- and second-degree murder. On Wednesday, he remained in Houston awaiting extradition to Alaska.

"I'm feeling really good today. This is a Thanksgiving that I'll never forget. I believe in God and my prayers have been answered," said Barras' mother, Rita Barras. "I've been waiting for the day. He was gone for two years but they finally got him. And I can't wait for his trial."

It all began just after 1 a.m. Sept. 29, 2007, when police found Barras lying in the alley, covered in blood but still conscious. Though his head was heavily bandaged, he was able to walk away from the scene. His brain was bleeding, however, and Barras died the next day.

Police say a dispute between the men in which Patrick and Anderson accused Barras of robbing them over drugs preceded the fatal beating.

"I don't think it was entirely clear what the interaction was," assistant district attorney Ben Hofmeister said. "Something happened, whether it was a robbery or something else, that precipitated the defendants to find (Barras) and engage in a fight in that alley."

Anderson, carrying two mop handles, and Patrick, with a metal baseball bat, charged into the alley and began beating Barras, according to documents filed in court charging them with murder. Anderson was arrested at the scene. He was convicted of second-degree murder Oct. 2 and is awaiting sentencing in January.

The trial was painful, Rita Barras said. She heard harsh allegations about her son and had to see the graphic video of his brutal beating. She couldn't turn away because she had to know the truth.

"It was a horrific way to die," Rita Barras said. "It never goes away."

Barras adopted Jamaal as a young boy. He was "a throwaway person," she said, meaning he had already been adopted and returned once. He had leukemia, which stopped him from joining the military, and enrolled at the University of Alaska Anchorage after high school, she said. Jamaal made some mistakes but was a good kid and she loved him, she said.

Police brought Patrick in for questioning later the morning of the attack. He denied involvement, saying he had been at his sister's house watching movies, and told investigators he wanted a lawyer, according to court documents. Police couldn't hold him.

The next day, the video surfaced showing an unarmed Barras being attacked by Anderson and Patrick.

"The key evidence was a video surveillance tape from the F Street Station bar," said Detective Sgt. Slawomir Markiewicz, head of the homicide unit. "It was actually pretty good quality and it happened right in front of the camera."

Once freed, Patrick boarded a plane for Guatemala, but was stopped in Los Angeles because he didn't have a passport, Foraker said. No one knew how he got to Guatemala without it, but police say he'd been living there and working odd jobs ever since.

Though not of Guatemalan decent, Patrick has family there and he stayed with them for a time, Foraker said. He didn't speak Spanish, but began learning it.

"He probably felt that if he was able to flee the U.S. he would be able to blend in down there and possibly never get apprehended," Foraker said. "He found out otherwise."

The Bureau of Diplomatic Security began working with Guatemalan National Police after it received information about the case from U.S. marshals, said David Bates, spokesman for Diplomatic Security, which has agents at embassies and consulates in more than 200 countries.

"Part of what they do is to keep good relations with local law enforcement so that when a guy like this is being sought for a crime as serious as that we can help find him and then facilitate his being taken into custody," Bates said.

Deputy U.S. Marshal Randy Coyne said the tip from "America's Most Wanted" helped nail the case.

"We got a tip telling us that he was in a certain area of Guatemala City," Coyne said. Guatemalan police "were able to, based on all the information that we provided them, determine that he was in that area and then they saw him and apprehended him."

Patrick's bail in the murder case has been set at $500,000 cash.

Find James Halpin online at adn.com/contact/jhalpin or call him at 257-4589.

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