Costa Rica deports arrested fugitive convict back to US

An escaped American inmate convicted of sex crimes has been arrested in Costa Rica after a year on the run and returned to the United States, officials said Monday.

John Wesley Saatio, 34, "has been returned to the United States," the Central American country's public security ministry said in a statement.

Saatio put up a struggle when he was arrested on June 2 in Jaco, a seaside resort town popular with foreigners.

While in a holding cell he "bent the bars and tried to flee" but was stopped and handed over to immigration officials for deportation, the statement said.

The ministry did not specify what day Saatio was sent back to America and its officials were not immediately contactable to elaborate.

Saatio, who is tall, bespectacled and with a shaved head and tattoos, escaped from a county jail in the northern US state of Michigan on June 19, 2015 after being arraigned on break-in charges. He was already serving a 25-year sentence for sexual offenses.

It was not immediately known how he managed to travel from the United States to Costa Rica.