WASHAKIE COUNTY, Wyoming (CNN) -- In the predawn darkness the agents switch the federal plates on their vehicles to local Wyoming tags and check they have no other signs showing they are from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. 

Edward Eugene Harper is believed to have lived a nomadic lifestyle since fleeing Mississippi. 

They want to give the impression that they are fish and wildlife officers, certainly not what they really are -- an elite squad in search of one of the FBI's 10 most-wanted fugitives. 

Their target lives eight miles up a dirt road in the Big Horn mountains of Washakie County -- and he is also not what he seems. 

For the past few years Edward Eugene Harper has been tending a flock of sheep in the semi-wilderness of the region. But 15 years ago he failed to turn up for a court appearance in Mississippi on charges he had molested two girls, aged 3 and 8. He'd been on the lam ever since. 

Recently the FBI had received a tip on his whereabouts. Watch how FBI planned hunt for fugitive » 

Snipers spent the night watching the truck with a camper top where Harper, 63, has been sleeping for the past few weeks. 

Michael Rankin, assistant special agent in charge at the FBI's Denver, Colorado, field office and leader of the operation to capture Harper, said he wanted to use a ruse to get close to Harper. 

"We don't want to alert him or anybody who might be a supporter of his, and we want to get as close to him without somehow raising his antenna that we may be law enforcement and we may be wanting to take him into custody," Rankin said. 
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