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U.S. Marshals Nab Nearly 2,500 Florida Fugitives

News Channel 8 photo by ERIC HAUSMANN

At the federal courthouse in Tampa, U.S. Marshals Service Deputy Director Brian Beckwith discusses Operation Orange Crush.

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By VALERIE KALFRIN

The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 19, 2008

TAMPA - A man accused in the 1998 rape of an 85-year-old Pinellas County woman is among nearly 2,500 fugitives captured during a focused law enforcement effort in Florida, officials said Thursday.

Operation Orange Crush involved the U.S. Marshals Service coordinating with more than 75 agencies statewide and 15 in the Bay area. The operation was funded through $2.8 million secured in 2007 by Republican Florida Sen. Mel Martinez, said Marshals Service Deputy Director Brian Beckwith.

Beckwith hopes the 10-week initiative spurs Congress to provide money to add 10 regional fugitive task forces nationwide. There are six throughout the country.

"We wanted to have a concentrated effort in Florida to show what we can do," Beckwith said. Arresting fugitives from Florida "has a national impact because of the tourism industry here. People bring their families from all over the country and all over the world to Florida."

The Marshals Service dispatched 28 deputy marshals from other states to Florida and provided communications equipment and access to databases, Beckwith said.

The operation ran from July 7 through Sept. 12, focusing on people wanted on violent felony charges. Locally, that included Luc Pierre-Charles Jr., 20, sought in the 2006 slayings of two Pasco County teenagers, and Courtenay Savage, 46, a former reserve officer for the Tampa Police Department sought on six counts of attempted murder related to firing into a Largo house in 2006. Neither was caught; Savage will be featured Saturday on TV's "America's Most Wanted," officials said.

Authorities arrested 2,497 fugitives during the operation. They included 113 wanted on homicide charges, 117 people wanted on weapons charges, 255 sex offenders and 55 people identified as gang members, officials said.

Of the total arrested, 179 had been sought in Hillsborough, Pinellas, Polk, Pasco, Hernando, Manatee and Sarasota counties. They include Peter Joseph Rosato Jr., 51, formerly of Dunedin, who has been wanted since 1999, when he failed to appear for trial on burglary and sexual battery charges in the attack on the 85-year-old Pinellas woman, officials said. Rosato now is being extradited to Pinellas County from Alaska, jail records show.

Other arrests related to local cases include Samuel Eric Brown, 28, of White Springs, charged in the rape and attempted murder of a woman in Ragan Park in July, and Tyree Jenkins, 22, of no known address, charged in the same slayings that involve Pierre-Charles, the Marshals Service said. Both are being held without bail at local jails.

At least one of those arrested during the operation has posted bail since his arrest. Jeffrey Mark Lew, 47, accused of wounding a man in a shooting at Club Prana in July, was released from a Hillsborough County Jail this month on a $30,000 surety bond, records show.

Deputy U.S. Marshal Scott Ley said the Lew arrest is significant to his agency because Lew was apprehended within about 24 hours. Once a person is arrested, their case is "in the court's hands," he said.

Tampa police Maj. George McNamara said the assistance of the Marshals Service resulted in 26 arrests in cases from his agency alone. "They have the contacts they can reach out to," such as relatives and intelligence, he said. They also aren't bound by a particular jurisdiction. "They go wherever they need to go."

Reporter Valerie Kalfrin can be reached at (813) 259-7800 or vkalfrin@tampatrib.com.

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