By Dan Parker

Police have arrested three San Antonio men in connection with the death of a fishing buddy whose body was found near Island Moorings Oct. 12, Port Aransas Police Chief Scott Burroughs said today, Friday, April 16.

Members of the Port Aransas Police Department and Texas Rangers made the arrests in San Antonio on Thursday, April 15, Burroughs said.

Burroughs said the men were booked at Nueces County Jail on charges of intoxication manslaughter. He didn’t immediately have the men’s names available.

Maxi Granados Jr., 60, of Red Oak, was camping with the three men at I.B. Magee Beach Park before his body was found lying on the ground next to the entrance to The Moorings, off Island Moorings Parkway, at 7:30 a.m. Oct. 12, police said.

A report from the Nueces County Medical Examiner’s Office stated that the man’s injuries appeared to have come from being hit by a car.

In an interview last year, Burroughs said he didn’t know whether Granados was hit at the scene where he was found, or if the impact took place elsewhere, with the body being dumped later off Island Moorings Parkway.

At the time of the incident, police said, the man’s companions said they didn’t know what happened to Granados. They said he was missing when they woke up at their campground on the morning of Oct. 12, according to police.

Detectives took impressions of the tires of a vehicle that belonged to one of the San Antonio men to see if marks on the tires matched marks found at the scene where the body was found.

Burroughs said forensic work led to the men’s arrests, but he wouldn’t say if the tire impressions were key.

Police believe a car driven by one of the men struck Granados, Burroughs said. Detectives are trying to determine whether it was an accident, he said.

All three men were charged with intoxication manslaughter because “if you help facilitate the commission of a crime, you can be charged as a party to that offense,” Burroughs said. “The charge is the same as for the offender.”