M-16-Toting Gringo Held in Murder Probe

U.S. citizen Frederick Marlon Kelch, 48, allegedly killed one of his neighbors, Tico doctor Harlen Fonseca, 28, in Moravia, northeast of San José last week. A bullet penetrated Fonseca’s skull, killing him almost instantly.

After the killing, Kelch barricaded himself for eight hours while police negotiated with him to surrender.

According to the daily La Nación, neighbors complained that Kelch, who lived with his wife and two children, had fired his guns indiscriminately into neighbors’ homes for more than a year.

He had an M-16, an illegal weapon, according to La Nación.

According to a court press release, a criminal judge ordered the U.S. citizen to be held in preventive prison for six months, three of which have to be in the NationalPsychiatric Hospital in Pavas.