SAN DIEGO, April 22 -- A two-year, international manhunt for one of Australia's most wanted men ended at a San Diego-area supermarket Friday evening when the accused drug smuggler was taken into custody without incident, FBI officials said Saturday. Ian Hall Saxon, a former rock concert promoter, escaped from Australian police in March 1993 while awaiting trial on drug and money laundering charges.
He had been charged with smuggling more than 10 tons of hashish into the country and laundering, in Australian currency, the equivalent of about $60 million, according to Jan Caldwell, a special agent with the FBI office in San Diego. Saxon was arrested by a team of American and Australian law enforcement officials as he tried to enter the Ralph's supermarket in Carlsbad, Calif. at about 5:20 p.m. Friday. He was scheduled to be arraigned on charges of being a fugitive from a foreign country before a San Diego federal judge on April 24. An extradition hearing was also expected to take place some time next week, Caldwell said. Authorities had been trailing Saxon ever since April 13, when San Diego FBI agents received an anonymous tip that he was in the area. The U.S. Attorney's Office issued an arrest warrant for Saxon on April 14, Caldwell said.
