Pair wanted in Harvey County triple killing captured in Mexico

Two fugitives wanted in the October killings of three people at a rural Harvey County home were captured Thursday in Mexico.

Harvey County Sheriff Chad Gay said Friday on the agency’s Facebook page that Myrta Rangel and Jereme Nelson were arrested on felony warrants issued in connection with the homicides and “are on American soil awaiting extradition back to Kansas.”

The pair were arrested “without incident” shortly after 7 p.m. Thursday by Mexican authorities and were then “handed over to the U.S. Marshals Service and returned to the U.S.,” the Kansas Bureau of Investigation said in a news release that followed Gay’s announcement. Both Rangel and Nelson were booked into the San Diego County jail and were expected to appear in a California court for an extradition hearing Friday, the KBI said.

Nelson, 35, and Rangel, 31, were wanted for capital murder and three counts of first-degree murder in the Oct. 30 shooting deaths of 33-year-old Travis Street, 37-year-old Angela Graevs and Richard Prouty, 52. Their bodies were found outside a rural home on Spring Lake Road in rural Moundridge where Street and Graevs lived with their 18-month-old son.

The toddler was found inside of the home unharmed but crying and screaming after authorities were alerted about the killings.

Prouty, of Newton, was a friend of the couple.

Nelson and Rangel were quickly identified as suspects in the case but fled the state before their arrest warrants were issued. The KBI said when it learned Nelson and Rangel fled the state after the killings, it started working with Mexican authorities through the Marshals to find their location and track their movements.

“I’m proud of the hard work our agents undertook to get to this point in the investigation,” KBI Director Kirk Thompson said in the agency’s news release. “We are pleased that the suspects will be brought back to Kansas and tried for these crimes.”

Earlier this week T. Walton, Harvey County’s longtime and newly retired sheriff, referenced the triple homicide in his final Facebook post on the agency’s page.

“I’m disappointed that we were unable to capture the suspects involved in the triple homicide before my term ran out,” he wrote Sunday evening, “but I am very confident they will eventually be brought in and justice will be served.”

A news conference is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Jan. 20 in the community room of the Harvey County Courthouse, 800 N. Main in Newton. The Harvey County Sheriff’s Office is expected to disclose more information about the arrests at that time.

This story was originally published January 13, 2017 at 1:42 PM with the headline "Pair wanted in Harvey County triple killing captured in Mexico."