Retired Phoenix Police Detective Robert Arce is speaking out about the execution-style murder of a federal agent with whom he closely worked. His slain friend, DEA Special Agent Richard Fass, was murdered by illegal aliens on June 30, 1994 near Phoenix, Arizona.

“My friend begged for his life as illegal aliens from Mexico handcuffed him and murdered him. They didn’t care that he was pleading for his life and his loved ones,” said Officer Arce.

The law enforcement experiences of Officer Arce, both in the Phoenix PD and abroad on contracts for the U.S. Department of State, led Breitbart Texas to bring him aboard in our efforts to expose Mexican transnational criminal groups with the Cartel Chronicles project. Officer Arce spoke candidly about his friend and coworker, DEA Special Agent Fass.

“This occurred during an undercover operation gone bad in Glendale, Arizona. These illegal aliens were posing as sellers of approximately 20 pounds of methamphetamine, with the intent of luring Agent Fass into a robbery. These criminal aliens had no intention of selling Agent Fass the methamphetamine; they only intended to rob him of the $140,000.00 USD agreed-upon price,” said Officer Arce.

He continued:

“Once the illegal aliens determined that Fass’ partner (who was at another location) was in possession of the agreed upon cash, the suspects attempted to kidnap Fass and two police informants inside the auto shop where they had met. The two criminal aliens pulled out handguns and handcuffs and placed agent Fass on his knees. During an ensuing scuffle, Fass was able to retrieve a firearm and wound one of his captors, but he was then executed by the second suspect.

We all believe that Fass decided to go down fighting, and did so by retrieving his concealed firearm and shooting one of the criminals. Tragically, when one of the criminals fired his first round at Fass, the round blew off the tip of Fass’s trigger finger and also damaged the trigger making his firearm inoperable. It was only at this point that the criminals executed the totally defenseless Fass. The two criminal aliens fled and were eventually captured in the nearby area. The third suspect who had ordered the kidnapping from a separate location fled to Mexico, but was later captured and extradited back to United States.

“A total of four suspects were convicted for Agent Fass’s murder; three received life sentences,” said Officer Arce. He continued:

In the 80s and 90s, law enforcement agencies throughout the southwest and California were required to recruit Spanish-speaking officers to work undercover narcotics, mainly due to the influx of illegal alien drug gangs who were pouring across the open southern border.

The same phenomenon occurred in Florida and along the Eastern Seaboard, as well as Chicago, with the influx of Colombian and Caribbean-based drug gangs. These assignments required officers with Spanish-speaking language skills that would enable them to gain the trust of the criminal alien gangs operating in the United States — these gangs in the southwest had direct links to Mexico. This work was extremely dangerous since it required face to face negotiations with heavily armed gangs that would commonly utilize counter-surveillance techniques, due to the large amount of money and drugs involved. It was not uncommon for undercover officers to discover that these drug gangs were very sophisticated with their own surveillance techniques.

During this time, these undercover teams were operating from the seat of their pants, developing their tradecraft as they went along. There was very little training available to the undercover officers, and what was available were basic drug identification courses which were of very little use for dangerous and complicated undercover operations. This period was the infancy of undercover operations; today’s training incorporates lessons learned from mistakes made from my generation.

I was one of these Spanish speaking detectives. When now meeting with my old undercover peers, we laugh and joke of some of the close calls we had, although these calls were not something to joke about at the time. I feel very fortunate to have worked with Richard and honored to have called him a friend. He truly was a star and a very courageous man. We still feel sadness for the loss of our brother, DEA Special Agent Richard Fass … RIP brother.

Officer Arce said, “The time has come to tell people about these courageous cops I served with and worked alongside of. These stories are often ignored for political reasons and the experiences and lessons of my generation should not be forgotten simply because concerns with political correctness.”

Brandon Darby is managing director and editor-in-chief of Breitbart Texas. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project with Ildefonso Ortiz and Stephen K. Bannon. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. He can be contacted at bdarby@breitbart.com.

Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart Texas. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and Stephen K. Bannon.  You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook.