Butler County authorities worked the case for two decades with federal authorities to bring Riano, 63, back to Hamilton on charges related to the shooting of Benjamin Becarra, a 25-year-old man killed on Dec. 19, 2004, at the Round House bar at East Avenue and Long Street.
Riano was indicted on murder charges in February 2005, but authorities said he fled the country right before the indictment, leaving his wife and children in Hamilton.
Credit: Nick Graham
Credit: Nick Graham
Last summer, the U.S. Marshals Service and the Butler County Prosecutor’s Office announced Riano had been arrested in his hometown of Zapotitlan Palmas, a town in the state of Oaxaca in southwestern Mexico. He was extradited to the United States on Aug. 1, and arraigned on the charge the following day in Butler County Common Pleas Court.
Hamilton attorney Kara Blackney was appointed as Riano’s public defender, and declined to comment on the case, as did Butler County Prosecutor Mike Gmoser. Assistant Prosecutor Brad Burress will lead the state’s case. Butler County Common Pleas Judge Michael Oster will preside over the trial.
Court documents show Blackney will say Riano acted in self-defense. Surveillance video showed Riano firing at Becarra, but he told police he was shot at first.
Becarra was shot in the head outside the Round House Bar at East Avenue and Long Street, according to court records. Witnesses identified the suspect as “El Diablo,” who authorities say was Riano.
Police said the gun used was found in Riano’s bathroom. Also, a search of his residence turned up ammunition that was purchased 45 minutes before the shooting, according to court records.
Blackney attempted in March to suppress the police interrogation of Riano when he was first interviewed in August 2024, but Oster denied her motion.
Riano has been held without bond in the Butler County Jail since he was extradited from Mexico, where he was working as a police officer in his hometown.
Over the past two decades, the Butler County Prosecutor’s Office has partnered with the U.S. Marshals Service and the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of International Affairs in working with Mexican law enforcement to arrest Riano and bring him back to the U.S.
He had been on the Butler County Sheriff’s Office’s “Most Wanted” list, and in 2005, the case was profiled on the America’s Most Wanted television series.
The trial was initially scheduled for April but continued until Tuesday morning. Several subpoenas have been served leading up to the trial, but a material witness, firearms examiner Andrew McClelland, with the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation, was deposed as he would not be able to attend the trial. According to court records, McClelland was responsible for the ballistics examination on the alleged weapon and the bullet recovered from Becarra’s body.
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