Police Mount Intensive Campaign to Catch 20 Most Wanted Child Abusers
The Fuerza Pública has said enough! to child abusers and are mounting an intensive campaign to catch the 20 most wanted abusers. The announcement comes following the arrest of 53 year old Victor Vargas, who in 1996 had been convicted and sentenced to 16 years in jail for child abuse but was still at large and working as a teacher at the Liceo Alfaro Ruiz, in Zarcero.

On Tuesday, agents of the Dirección de Investigaciones Especializadas (DIE) who had been looking for Vargas, finally caught up with him at the school and took him away as his students looked on. Vargas had been free on bail following his appeal to his sentence 1996 but then decided to run when his appeal was rejected and has been on the lam ever since.

An the Vargas case is not an isolated one, say Walter Navarro, Director of the Fuerza Pública.

For the agents of the Dirección de Investigaciones Especializadas, they see the score as one down and nineteen to go.

According to Navarro, even though the nineteen are free, police have plenty of information on their whereabouts and will be caught. Navarro said that his police force will not distribute fotos of the men they are looking to avoid that they go into deeper hiding.

What has police worried is that these abusers have integrated themselves into the everyday life of many communities that know nothing of their past and how dangerous they are.

Vargas had been welcomed to Zarcero and students and parents were shocked to see one of their favourite teachers on national television and wanted for abusing children.

Police fear the others may have doing the same and can strike at any moment.