The eight-month search for Irvin “Chubby” Martin ended Sunday night in Arkansas, where authorities arrested the Gum Spring native after a segment on him aired on “America’s Most Wanted.”

Martin, 45, had fled the area in the days after allegedly beating Missy Riley Feb 5 at her home in Goochland with a golf club. He had last been seen at a McDonald’s in Zion’s Crossroads in the days after the attack, according to Goochland Sheriff James L. Agnew.

But all of that changed this past weekend when the long-running crime series set up camp in Goochland to tape a pice on the crime for last saturday’s show.

Host John Walsh was almost prophetic last Tuesday when he told Agnew, prior to shooting segments for the show, “We’re going to get this guy.”

“Lt. [James] Mann was in the studio in Washington, D.C. Saturday night and he said within minutes, the phones started lighting up,” Agnew said. “Within the first half hour, he was talking with a tipster in Oklahoma who was sure she had positively identified Martin.”

Within 24 hours of his AMW profile, Martin had been placed in Oklahoma and Arkansas. The trail began when callers reported seeing Martin in Pocola, Okla., where tipsters say he had relocated, using the name “Derek Flemington.”

According to the tips, Martin was working odd jobs and had become a part of the local community. He was quickly recognized by many when his AMW profile aired and apparently was tipped off by someone that he had been on television.

“The other police departments tracked him to a residence he had set up in Pocola,” Lt. Brent Grill with the Van Buren Police Department said. “But apparently, he had been made aware of the show and had fled the area.”

But Martin wouldn’t stay hidden long.

Another caller reported Martin in nearby Van Buren, Ark., located about 10 miles up Interstate 540 just across the border from Pocola. There, a woman identified Martin as a man whom she had recently befriended. She said Martin had called her that night looking for a ride to Texas.

Throughout Sunday evening, Grill said Martin would relocate, touch base with the informant, and try to persuade her again to come pick him up.

“She continued to work with us as the locations changed,” Grill said.

When Van Buren officers pulled into a gas station, ironically located about two blocks from the police station, they noticed a man duck down quickly in the back of a red Jeep Cherokee.

“We were on the lookout for someone on foot but he made it so obvious that officers quickly went to question the person in the back seat of that Jeep and it ended up being Chubby Martin,” Grill said.

The person attempted to identify himself as “Kevin Jenkins,” while the two other people in the car said they had agreed to give him a ride after church, though “Jenkins” had never said where.

Van Buren investigators later matched “Jenkins’” fingerprints and photograph with that of an Irvin “Chubby” Martin, who was wanted in Goochland. He was arrested just before 10 p.m. and his identity was confirmed at about 1:30 a.m., when Goochland officials contacted their counterparts in Arkansas, Agnew said.

“Martin apparently was trying to hide in anonymity,” he said. “He had set up several aliases and was working odd jobs in a couple of places. Without the program, he’d still be out there doing his thing.”

Agnew added that Martin, as of Tuesday morning, was being held in Crawford County, Ark. as local officials determined how he would be transported back to Virginia.

Grill said Martin has an additional charge of forgery hanging over him related to documents he signed during his arrest, though the department expects him to be extradited to Virginia this week.

When he eventually makes his return to the Commonwealth, Martin will face charges of attempted capital murder, malicious wounding, robbery, breaking and entering, and auto theft.