Same name, same birthdate, wrong man in border child-rape arrest.

Was it mistaken identity? Identity theft? An incredible coincidence?

Fidel Venzor-Melendez doesn't seem that common a name, and the odds that two people with that name would share the same birthdate -- March 23, 1959 -- would appear to be astronomical.

But when U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents arrested a man on Wednesday at the Presidio port of entry in South Texas, they thought they'd caught the person of that name and age wanted in Dona Ana County for child rape, the Las Cruces Sun-News reported today in its online edition.

But it turned out to be the wrong man, the paper reported.

Customs agents had matched the man stopped at the border with information of a national database of wanted persons and an outstanding warrant from Dona Ana County, according to the Sun-News.

But Dona Ana County Sheriff's Sgt. Mark Perea called the feds on Thursday and told them they had the wrong man -- a fact confirmed by District Attorney Susana Martinez, the Sun-News reported. And the man was released from federal custody.

The Venzor-Melendez wanted in Dona Ana County was indicted by a grand jury in August 2004 on 14 counts of rape of a child under 13 and one count of molesting a child under 13 -- adding up to 255 years in prison, if convicted, but the man went missing, the Sun-News reported.

The man apprehended at the border is a Mexican citizen living legally in Joshua, Texas, according to the paper.

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