Profile

Name: Manuel "Demon" Tarango Jr.
Aliases: Demon
Sex: Male
Race: Hispanic
Age Now: 27
Height: 5'10\"
Weight: 185
Hair (Color, Description, Facial Hair): Brown
Eyes (Color and Correction): Hazel
Other Physical Characteristics: May have thin moustache and shaved head, or very close cropped hair
Wanted for: Attempted Murder ; Dec 05, 1999
Armed Robbery ; Dec 05, 1999

Locations

Last seen: Unkown
Possible location: Mexico City, Mexico
Last known: Unkown

Traits

Originally from Dell City, Texas
Police say Tarango is gang-affiliated and is known on the street as Demon
His mother and father still live in Las Vegas
May have fled to Mexico City, Mexico
Police say he smokes PCP and marijuana

Case Story

Nobody Robs a Bar Full of Cops

It was the night of December 5th, 1999.  Mr. D's Sports Bar was packed and rocking to the sounds of its favorite house band.   The lead singer was \"Metro\" Mike Richards, and his bandmates was Las Vegas Metropolitan Police officers.  The band's name -- \"Pigs In A Blanket\".   Many of the patrons in the bar that night were off-duty Vegas cops who'd come out to support their buddies in the band.  Officer Dennis Devitte, a twenty-year veteran patrol officer, was there that night, patting his feet to the beat and digging the scene.  Everyone was having a great time until three young men, all wearing masks and brandishing handguns, stormed into the bar through the back door by the kitchen barking orders and announcing a robbery.  John \"John-John\" Santasiero was sitting at the bar with some friends when one of the robbers attempted to jump between them and over the bar to get to the cash register.  John and his buddies were not having it.  They immediately snatched the gunman down off of the bar and starting kicking his butt.   During the struggle, that robber started shooting wildly and wounded John in the arm.  Then, all hell broke loose as a second robber opened fire, shooting randomly into the crowd of scrambling bar patrons and band members.  The third robber had already run around to the front of the bar when Dennis Devitte pulled his .25 caliber Beretta pocket pistol and sprung into action.  As the bar's surviellance cameras captured the dramatic scene, Dennis and the gunman stood toe to toe and emptied their clips of bullets into each other's bodies at point-blank range.  Dennis took hits from seven large caliber bullets, but managed to place all of his rounds into the body of the gunman.  The other two robbers broke off the attack and scrambled out the back door to their getaway car where the wheel-man was waiting.  The robber Dennis shot, staggered out the front door of the bar and dropped dead on the sidewalk a few feet away from the door.  Inside the bar,  Metro Mike and his fellow cops administered first aid to Dennis and tried to stop the bleeding from his numerous gunshot wounds.   In all, seven people were wounded inside the bar that night including Dennis, who was the most seriously injured victim.  Within minutes, scores of police and paramedic units converged on the chaotic scene.  Detective Jimmy Vaccaro, a veteran homicide investigator from LVMPD was the lead investigator on the case.  He quickly realized that it was a miracle that given the number of guns and bullets involved in the incident, the only fatality was one of the bad guys.  That miracle was due to the heroic actions of Dennis Devitte. 

Cops ID the Robbers

At the scene, police found one of the cloth handkerchief masks on the floor near where John Santasiero and his friends had struggled with the robber who tried to jump the bar.  That mask, would become a key piece of evidence in identifying one of the alleged stick up men.  That robber, Detective Vaccaro would quickly determine, was Manuel Tarango Jr., a local gang member.  Under court order, Tarango's parents reluctantly provided DNA samples that matched DNA taken from the cloth mask.   Manuel, however, was nowhere to be found in Las Vegas.  During questioning, his mother told Detective Vaccaro that her son had gone to Mexico City to, \"attend college.\"  From gang-banger to overnight college student...Vaccaro didn't buy it for a second, but he knew that the Tarango family was not about to help him find their son.  Dennis Devitte spent five months recuperating from his wounds and undergoing multiple operations.  Then, to the amazement of everyone, he put on his uniform and went back to patrolling the streets of the city he loves so much. After searching for Manuel Tarango from December '99 into the late spring of 2000, Detective Vaccaro contacted AMW correspondent, Tom Morris Jr.  The two men had worked many cases together over the years, all ending with a capture.  In August of 2000, Manuel Tarango made his first of what would be five profiles on AMW.  Each time tips came in of sightings in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. But it was the Texas tips that intrigued Detective Vaccaro the most.  Vaccaro, \"We knew that Tarango was originally born in Dale City, Texas and still had family in southern Texas.  The show kept running him over and over again and the tips were all pointing to southern Texas along the border. Everntually we started saying out loud to ourselves, I'll betcha he's going to Mexico.\"

AGENT SCOTT BAKKEN JOINS THE HUNT FOR TARANGO

In the fall of 2003, FBI special agent Scott Bakken from the Las Vegas field office was in Detective Jimmy Vaccaro's office at LVMPD Homicide discussing a case unrelated to the Mr. D's shootout.  \"One thing I always noticed about dealing with Jimmy was that on the grease board behind his desk he had Manuel Tarango's name and the case file number written up there,\" Scott said, \"and even though this case had happened back in 1999, which was almost four years ago at the time, I knew it was something that Jimmy was always thinking about.\"  So special agent Scott Bakken offered the assistance of the joint fugitive task force in Las Vegas.  After reviewing the case thoroughly and comparing notes with Jimmy Vaccaro, it was decided that they attempt to get a judge to authorize a wire tap on Tarango's parent's phone number in Las Vegas.  They suspected that wherever Manuel was hiding out, he was maintaining contact with his mom, dad and little teenaged sister Myra.  In November 2003 a judge authorized the wiretap and the invesitgators began monitoring the Tarango family's calls.  Scott Bakken didn't have to wait long for the tap to pay off.  \"I think we're maybe seven or eight days into it before Manuel finally appeared on it.  And he didn't just appear on it saying hello and goodbye.  He was actually reliving that night of the shooting like it happened yesterday.\"   Detective Vaccaro and agent Bakken were stunned, but pleasantly surprised to actually hear Tarango place himself at the scene of the Mr. D's shootout/robbery in detail.  They would still need several more months of investigation to pinpoint exactly where in Mexico Tarango was placing the calls from.