US ‘Most Wanted’ sex offender captured in Belize

After his release, Snyder was supposed to register as a sex offender and meet with his probation officer. He did neither. Instead, he fled and eventually ended up in Belize.

BELMOPAN, Belize, December 7, 2009 – One of America’s most wanted – a convicted child molester who fled the United States after failing to register as a sex offender – has been caught in Belize where he was working as a chess instructor in schools for more than a year. He is the second American fugitive to be nabbed in the country in recent months.

Robert Snyder, who taught the children and even married a local police officer under the alias, Augustin Rios, was apprehended by authorities over the weekend. He was nabbed a week after being featured on the popular television series, ‘America’s Most Wanted’ (AMW).

The chess instructor and author was arrested in September 2005 and, under an agreement with prosecutors, pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor counts of Unlawful Sexual Conduct, and agreed to a two-year prison term. He began serving his sentence in January 2007 and was released on August 24th, 2008.

After his release, Snyder was supposed to register as a sex offender and meet with his probation officer. He did neither. Instead, he fled and eventually ended up in Belize.

Snyder could now face another decade behind bars for two counts of failing to register.

According to the AMW website, police said that Snyder used his work to get close to children.

Lawmen said he took advantage of one child after he befriended his mother at chess tournaments, and she eventually became his wife. This, cops allege, allowed Snyder to spend more time with the young boy, taking him out of the state on trips, and over a four-month period, sexually molesting him and training him to be his sex slave.

Eventually the child got the courage to tell his mother that he did not want to go out of town with Snyder anymore and when the woman refused to leave her son alone with him, they separated. A year later, the child told a therapist that Snyder had sexually molested him.

The second case took place at Snyder’s home in 2005 during a weekend chess camps.

Police say 14 kids were at Snyder's home for the weekend. The children were supposed to be paired up to sleep in separate rooms, but the man had two young boys sleep in his own bedroom.

Over the course of the night, after one child fell asleep, cops say Snyder coaxed the other young boy onto his bed and molested him. At the end of the workshop, the child went home, and told his parents what happened.

In September a former United States deputy sheriff, Derrick Yancey, who was wanted for the murder of his wife and another man, was also captured in Belize.

He was held in a bar in Punta Gorda, the largest town in southern Belize.

Yancey had also been featured on the America’s Most Wanted programme.