Why would FBI fugitive hide in rural Wales?

Earlier this week one of America’s most wanted men was finally arrested in rural north Wales having spent the past 21 years on the run.

Daniel Andreas San Diego, 46, was wanted by the FBI for allegedly bombing two office buildings in San Francisco in 2003.

But why would the suspect, who was born in Berkeley, California, choose to hide out in Maenan in the remote outskirts of the sleepy market town of Llanrwst in the Conwy valley?

And of all the countries in the world, why Wales?

“It’s beautiful… if you’re trying to evade capture, you might as well be somewhere that’s stunning and beautiful,” said former undercover detective Peter Bleksley.

Peter, who is probably best known for his time capturing make-believe fugitives on Channel 4’s TV show Hunted, said picking somewhere so remote had pros and cons.

“Being remote you can be living in a property where neighbours can’t see you, the public’s prying eyes are a long way away and you’re not going to face uncomfortable questions like you might do if you were living in a terraced house in a city, for example,” he said.

He said there would also be benefits to choosing to hide in a big city.

“You could be anonymous because people don’t talk to each other, they sit cheek by jowl on the bus or on the tube and still don’t speak to each other, if you say hello to people they think you’re a nutter, so cities are sometimes favoured because of the anonymity they can offer,” he said.

“The flip side of that, of course, is CCTV is everywhere in our major cities, which is a concern for fugitives.”

Mr San Diego, who the FBI has previously called an “animal rights extremist”, was held after an operation backed by counter terrorist police and North Wales Police on Monday.

He now faces extradition to the US after being arrested at a property in a remote rural area near woodland in north Wales.

Earlier this week Aled Evans told how he unknowingly sold his home to Mr San Diego.

He said in August 2023, using the name Danny Webb, Mr San Diego had paid £425,000 for the white villa with a balcony offering striking views of rolling hills and a well-manicured garden the house near Llanrwst in August 2023 using the name Danny Webb.

Reflecting on recent events he has realised it was the ideal location “if you wanted to keep your head down”.

Peter believes it was most likely the purchase of this property that marked the start of the end of Mr San Diego’s life on the run.

“Maybe purchasing that property created the electronic footprint opportunity for the FBI to exploit, which therefore led to his capture,” he said.

“Gone are the days when drug dealers could walk into an estate agents with carrier bags full of cash and literally go ‘I’ll buy that flat or I’ll buy that house’ because of course we have money laundering regulations, banks have to ask certain questions of people if they transfer a sizable sum of money.

“If anybody involved in that process, be it estate agent bank, solicitors, had any suspicions as to the money trail and they flagged it up to the authorities, that would start an investigation.”

Although he has spent a career hunting down others, Peter has some experience of what it is like to live a life in hiding.

While working at Scotland Yard’s undercover unit his identity was exposed and he had to go into witness protection.

“Living a life continually looking over your shoulder is very unpleasant,” he said.

“You’re always fearful of that knock on the door… it can be very draining, although the longer you do it, the more you get used to it.”

He said living that way for an extended period of time could lead to sloppy mistakes.

“That’s the danger, and, of course, keeping your guard up all the time requires constant vigilance, which is draining… maybe his guard did drop just a little bit.”

Through his career, Peter has had quite the insight into the behaviour of fugitives.

“I’ve caught real ones when I was a detective and I caught many pretend ones when I was the chief in Hunted,” he said.

So having seen the mistakes that lead to capture, what advice would he give to someone who wants to remain in hiding?

“Be nice to people,” he said.

“If you’re nice, they’ll feed you, they’ll clothe you, they’ll take you where you want to go, they’ll give you cash or other financial means.

“If you’re not, if you’re unpleasant and you upset people, they’ll pick up the phone and grass you up.”

He has this theories but Peter is eager to find out the truth about what led to Mr San Diego’s arrest.

“I do hope we get to find out how it was caught, how it all unravelled because it’ll be great,” he said.

“And I suspect Netflix are all over this story already.”

Maenan sits just off the A470, one of the main roads running through north Wales, about 10 miles (16km) from Conwy.

It is a sprawling community of farms and isolated cottages, many of which are now holiday homes or holiday lets. There is no shop or village pub.

Many of the properties that you pass on the way to Llidiart y Coed appear to be holiday homes.

The FBI has accused Mr San Diego of being “an animal rights extremist” involved in a series of bombings in San Francisco.

The first bombing happened in August 2003, outside the Chiron Life Science Center in Emeryville, California.

A second bomb was found at the site by authorities but exploded before it could be defused.

The agency said that raised the possibility the device was planted specifically to target first responders.

Less than a month later, in September 2003, a nail bomb exploded outside a nutritional products corporation based in Pleasanton, California.

He became the first “domestic terrorist” to be added to the agency’s most wanted terrorist list, created by then-President George W Bush in October 2001 in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.