| Federal Bureau of Investigation | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Common name | Federal Bureau of Investigation | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Abbreviation | FBI | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Seal of the Federal Bureau of Investigation | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list arose from a conversation held in late 1949 between J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation, and William Kinsey Hutchinson,[2] International News Service (the predecessor of the United Press International) Editor-in-Chief, who were discussing ways to promote capture of the FBI's "toughest guys". This discussion turned into a published article, which received so much positive publicity that on March 14, 1950, the FBI officially announced the list to increase law enforcement's ability to capture dangerous fugitives.[3]
Individuals are removed from this list if the fugitive is captured, killed, or if the charges against them are dropped; they are then replaced by a new entry selected by the FBI. In five cases, the FBI removed individuals from the list after deciding that they were no longer a "particularly dangerous menace to society".[2] Víctor Manuel Gerena, added to the list in 1984, has been on the list longer than anyone, at 28 years. Billie Austin Bryant spent the shortest amount of time on the list, being listed for two hours in 1969.[4] On rare occasions, the FBI will add a "Number Eleven" if that individual is extremely dangerous but the Bureau does not feel any of the current ten should be removed.[5]
The list is commonly posted in public places such as post offices. In some cases, fugitives on the list have turned themselves in on becoming aware of their listing. As of November 1, 2009, 494 fugitives have been listed (eight of them women), and 463 (94%) captured or located,[6] 152 (33%) of them due to public assistance.[7] The FBI maintains other lists of individuals, including the Most Wanted Terrorists,[8] along with crime alerts, missing persons, and other fugitive lists.
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The Criminal Investigative Division (CID) at FBI Headquarters calls upon all 56 Field Offices to submit candidates for the FBI's "Ten Most Wanted Fugitives" list.[9] The nominees received are reviewed by Special Agents in the CID and the Office of Public Affairs.[9] The selection of the "proposed" candidate(s) is forwarded to the Assistant Director of the CID for his/her approval and then to the FBI's Director for final approval.[9] This processes takes some time which is why Osama Bin Laden, who was killed by U.S. military forces on May 2, 2011,[10] and James Joseph "Whitey" Bulger, Jr., who was arrested in Santa Monica, California on June 22, 2011[11], are both still on the FBI Top Ten list [12] and despite no longer being at large.
Rewards are offered for information leading to capture of fugitives on the list; the reward is $100,000 for the eight on the list who haven't been captured.
| Photo | Name | Date added | Sequence number |
|---|---|---|---|
| Víctor Manuel Gerena | May 14, 1984 | #386 | |
| Victor Manuel Gerena is wanted in connection with the armed robbery of approximately $7 million from a security company in West Hartford, Connecticut, in 1983. He allegedly took two security employees hostage at gunpoint and handcuffed, bound, and injected them with an unknown, non-lethal substance to further disable them. The FBI is offering a reward of up to $1,000,000 for information leading to Gerena's capture.[13][14] | |||
| Glen Stewart Godwin | December 7, 1996 | #447 | |
| Glen Stewart Godwin is wanted for his 1987 escape from Folsom State Prison in California, where he was serving a lengthy sentence for murder. He was subsequently imprisoned in Mexico on drug trafficking charges, but escaped from prison after allegedly murdering a fellow inmate.[15][16] | |||
| Usama Bin Laden[a][17] Full name: Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden Arabic: أسامة بن محمد بن عوض بن لادن |
June 7, 1999 | #456 | |
| Usama bin Laden[a] (Osama bin Laden) was the leader of al-Qaeda and was wanted in connection with the August 7, 1998, bombings of the United States embassies, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya. These attacks killed over 200 people. Bin Laden and al-Qaeda are alleged to be responsible for the October 12, 2000, attack on the USS Cole off the coast of Yemen, which killed 17. Although bin Laden later appeared on the first publicly released FBI Most Wanted Terrorists list on October 10, 2001, he was listed there for his alleged role in the 1998 embassy attack, and not for his alleged role in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people, because the most wanted lists name fugitives charged with a crime by a prosecutor or under indictment by a grand jury. Bin Laden was named as an "unindicted co-conspirator" in, for instance, the federal indictment against convicted terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui, but has not been formally indicted for his alleged role in the September 11, 2001, attacks. On May 2, 2011[b], Osama bin Laden was confirmed killed by United States special forces in an announcement from the President of the United States, Barack Obama, in a press conference at the White House.
Osama bin Laden was the subject of a $50 million[18] reward through the State Department's Rewards for Justice program targeting international fugitives, especially alleged terrorists, plus $2 million through a program developed and funded by the Air Line Pilots Association and the Air Transport Association.[a][19][20] Osama bin Laden was killed on May 2, 2011[b], and has been declared deceased on the FBI Most Wanted website. Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden's top deputy, was expected to replace bin Laden on the Most Wanted list, for his involvement in the same crimes.[21] However, on June 23, 2011, the FBI announced it was unlikely that another terrorist would be added to the ten most wanted list.[22] |
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| James Joseph "Whitey" Bulger, Jr. | August 19, 1999 | #458 | |
| James J. Bulger was wanted for his role in 19 counts of murders committed from the early 1970s through the mid-1980s in connection with his leadership of an organized crime group that allegedly controlled extortion, drug deals, and other illegal activities in the Boston, Massachusetts, area. He has a violent temper and is known to carry a knife at all times. He was the boss of Boston's Winter Hill Gang before he went into hiding. The reward for information leading to Bulger's capture was $2,000,000.[23][24] Bulger was arrested in Santa Monica, California on June 22, 2011.[25] | |||
| Robert William "Bobby" Fisher, Sr. | June 29, 2002 | #475 | |
| Robert William Fisher is wanted for murder of his wife Mary and their two children Robert, Jr. and Brittney and then blowing up the house in which they all lived in Scottsdale, Arizona, in April 2001. Investigators have considered that Robert Fisher murdered his family because he felt threatened by his wife's intent to divorce.[26][27] | |||
| Alexis Flores | June 2, 2007 | #487 | |
| Alexis Flores is wanted for the kidnapping and murder of five-year-old Iriana DeJesus in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in July 2000. He was deported back to his native Honduras in 2005 after serving a prison term for forgery in Arizona.[28][29] | |||
| Jason Derek Brown | December 8, 2007 | #489 | |
| Jason Derek Brown is wanted for murder and armed robbery in Phoenix, Arizona. Authorities say that in November 2004, Brown allegedly shot and killed an armored car guard outside a movie theater and fled on a bicycle with $56,000 in a duffel bag.[30][31] | |||
| Jose Luis "Joe" Saenz | October 19, 2009 | #492 | |
| Jose Luis Saenz is wanted for allegedly shooting and killing two rival gang members in Los Angeles on July 25, 1998. Then, less than two weeks later, on August 5, 1998, Saenz allegedly kidnapped, raped, and murdered his girlfriend. Additionally, Saenz is also a suspect of a 2008 murder in Whittier, California.[32] | |||
| Eduardo "Tablas" Ravelo | October 21, 2009 | #493 | |
| Eduardo Ravelo is wanted for his alleged involvement in racketeering activities, conspiracy to launder monetary instruments, and conspiracy to possess heroin, cocaine and marijuana with the intent to distribute. His alleged criminal activities began in 2003.[33] | |||
| Semion Mogilevich Full name: Semion Yudkovich Mogilevich Ukrainian: Семен Ю́дкович Могиле́вич |
October 22, 2009 | #494 | |
| Semion Mogilevich is wanted for his alleged participation in a multi-million dollar scheme to defraud thousands of investors in the stock of a public company incorporated in Canada, but headquartered in Newtown, Pennsylvania, between 1993 and 1998. The scheme to defraud collapsed in 1998, after thousands of investors lost in excess of $150 million, and Mogilevich, thought to have allegedly funded and authorized the scheme, was indicted in April 2003.[34] | |||
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