Blue Alert: FBI searching for 12th Alvarado ICE detention center attack suspect
A 12th suspect has been identified and is wanted on charges in the July 4 attack that wounded a police officer at an immigration detention facility in Alvarado, federal officials said.
The FBI’s Dallas office is seeking 32-year-old Benjamin Hanil Song, a former Marine Corps reservist, in connection to the ambush at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Prairieland Detention Center, according to a wanted poster for Song.
Song allegedly bought four guns, including three AR-style rifles and a pistol, that were used in the ambush, officials with the U.S. Attorney’s Office in North Texas said. One of the AR-style rifles was equipped with a “binary trigger,” which allows a shooter to fire more rapidly than a standard semiautomatic gun, federal officials said in a news release.
Ten people involved in the ambush were arrested that night or early the next morning, but Song evaded capture, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Song’s cellphone location data allegedly shows that the phone was within “several hundred meters” of the ICE detention center between late in the evening July 4 until after dark July 5.
On July 6, a Mercedes-Benz registered to a relative of Song was found near the home of another suspect, according to a criminal complaint. A traffic camera at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport showed a person thought to be Song driving the Mercedes on May 23, weeks before the ambush.
Song is charged with three counts of attempted murder of federal agents and three counts of discharging a firearm in relation to a crime of violence, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
State officials issued a Blue Alert for Song on Wednesday night, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety. A Blue Alert is designed to help apprehend anyone who has killed or injured a law enforcement officer and is considered a threat to the public.
Johnson County authorities have issued additional warrants for his arrest on charges of aggravated assault on a public servant, aiding terrorism and engaging in organized crime, according to Texas DPS.
Anyone with information is asked to call the FBI at 1-800-225-5324. The FBI is offering a reward of up to $25,000 for information that leads to Song’s arrest.
The Texas Department of Public Safety also has added Song to the Texas 10 Most Wanted Fugitives List, and Texas Crime Stoppers is offering a cash reward of up to $10,000 for information leading to his arrest.
Song is considered armed and dangerous, according to the FBI. He is 5 feet 6 inches tall and weighs about 150 pounds, according to the alert, which said he has ties to Dallas County, including the cities of Dallas and Addison.
11 other suspects in ambush arrested
In a criminal complaint filed Monday, authorities named 10 other suspects who are in custody: Autumn Hill, of Dallas; Savanna Batten, of Fort Worth; Nathan Baumann, of College Station; Zachary Evetts, of Waxahachie; Joy Gibson, of Dallas; Meagan Morris, of Dallas; Maricela Rueda, of Fort Worth; Seth Sikes, of Kennedale; and Elizabeth Soto and Ines Soto, of Fort Worth.
Those 10 suspects also are charged with three counts of attempted murder of federal agents and three counts of discharging a firearm in relation to a crime of violence.
According to the complaint, the group was dressed in black military-style clothing, with some wearing body armor and masks. They began shooting fireworks toward the ICE detention facility, and some of the suspects sprayed graffiti on cars and a guard structure in the parking lot, which investigators believe were tactics intended to draw officers out of the building for an ambush, the complaint states.
Correctional officers called 911 to report the suspicious activity. An Alvarado police officer who was the first to respond was shot in the neck when he got out of his car, according to authorities, who said the shooter fired from the nearby woods. Another assailant across the street “fired 20 to 30 rounds at unarmed correctional officers who had stepped outside the facility,” to try to talk to the group, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
The Alvarado officer was flown to a hospital in Fort Worth, where he was treated and released, according to the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office.
The 11th suspect in the case, Daniel Rolando Sanchez Estrada, was arrested Tuesday and faces charges of tampering with evidence and conspiracy to tamper with evidence, according to court records.
Rueda called Sanchez Estrada on Sunday morning from the Johnson County Jail and asked him to tow her car from outside Morris’ home and to go to her house in Fort Worth and do “whatever you need to do, move whatever you need to move at the house,” the complaint states.
Sanchez Estrada told Rueda he had already gone to her house and said that “they were good,” by which investigators believe he meant her home had not yet been searched by police.
Authorities searched an apartment in Denton after Sanchez Estrada was seen carrying a box inside. The box contained training and planning documents for civil unrest, which included “anti-law enforcement, anti-government and anti-Trump sentiments,” investigators wrote in the criminal complaint against Sanchez Estrada.
When he was arrested on foot near the detention center, Baumann was carrying a backpack that contained flyers with slogans including “Fight ICE terror with class war!” and “Free all political prisoners,” according to the complaint.
Morris, who was stopped while driving away from the center, told investigators that some members of the group met online and Morris “transported some of them down from Dallas to the Prairieland Detention Center to ‘make some noise,’” the complaint states.
This story was originally published July 9, 2025 at 8:26 PM.
