A fugitive who had reportedly been off the grid since 2019 was captured in West Palm Beach on Wednesday, after a daytime manhunt that sent him scrambling across a neighbor's roof and ultimately into an easement between two backyard fences, where deputies say he was finally found and taken into custody.
According to CBS12, agents from the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office Fugitive Warrants Division went to a home on Christine Lane around 11:00 a.m. to arrest 39-year-old Yusley Chavez Barreto on an active Polk County warrant for failure to appear on a marijuana trafficking charge. People inside the home initially denied knowing him and, at one point, a woman released a large black dog into the backyard. Deputies say Chavez Barreto bolted, jumped a fence onto Gun Club Road, and climbed onto the roof of an outbuilding. As he ran, he broke through two sections of the outbuilding's roof, and a containment search later turned him up hiding in an easement between two fences.
How the warrants unit works
The Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office maintains a dedicated Fugitive Warrants Unit that processes and executes arrest warrants across the county. "The Fugitive Warrants Unit currently consists of twenty agents and three sergeants," according to the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office, which notes that the unit arranges extraditions and coordinates with partner agencies when serving warrants.
Charges and court status
Per CBS12, Chavez Barreto was booked into the Palm Beach County Jail on counts of burglary of an occupied dwelling, criminal mischief for damage to property, and resisting without violence. The outlet, citing an arrest affidavit, reports that records show Chavez Barreto has been "off the grid" since 2019, when he gave law enforcement a false name during a stop and then fled. He remains subject to the Polk County warrant tied to that earlier case.
Chavez Barreto now faces local processing in Palm Beach County while the Polk County warrant is resolved and prosecutors determine how to proceed. The case will follow standard court scheduling, and any extradition or transfer would be handled through the county's warrants unit and inter-county procedures.
