Edgar Gustavo Navarro (Deceased)

Kidnapping of Americans in Colombia.

RFJ paid a reward totaling $900,000 to three persons who provided information on the location of Edgar Navarro, a commander of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). 

In February 2003, Thomas Howes, Keith Stansell, and Marc Gonsalves, were taken hostage by the FARC when their U.S. airplane crashed in the Colombian jungle. FARC and its conspirators murdered two other occupants of the airplane, U.S. citizen Thomas Janis and Colombian national Sergeant Luis Alcides Cruz. 

Navarro, the deputy commander of the FARC’s Teofilo Forero Mobile Column, was suspected of involvement in the kidnapping. 

On October 19, 2003, three informants, motivated by the possibility of a reward, led a team of Colombian soldiers to Navarro’s camp in an attempt to capture him and other FARC members. Navarro was killed in the shootout with army troops. The three Americans were subsequently rescued on July 2, 2008, in a Colombian military operation.