JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Prosecutors in Jacksonville have asked the Mexican government for help catching a man charged with murdering three people in Texas last year.

In asking for assistance, prosecutors agreed not to seek the death penalty if Mexican authorities find and return Pinkney "Chip" Carter (pictured, left, in Channel 4 video taken while he was in a Mexican jail).

"I want to make it perfectly clear that I am doing this reluctantly, at your request as a representative of Mexico, because I understand that this is the only way your government will attempt to help us," State Attorney Harry Shorstein wrote to Consul Luz-Elena Bueno Zirion of the Mexican consulate in Orlando.

Elizabeth Smith Reed, 35, her 16-year-old daughter, Courtney Smith, and Reed's boyfriend, Glenn Pafford, 49, were fatally shot in Reed's Jacksonville home July 24, 2002.

Carter, Reed's former boyfriend, was being sought by Jacksonville homicide detectives for questioning in the triple slaying when he swam across the Rio Grande to avoid Texas police in August 2002.

Mexican authorities immediately arrested him on weapons charges but released him without explanation three months later. They waited more than a month before notifying Jacksonville police.

Carter hasn't been seen in nearly a year, according to Assistant State Attorney Bernie de la Rionda.