News Releases and Statements

The individuals were charged with crimes of robbery; assault with intent to cause injury to an officer, fireman, EMT, nurse or crossing guard; resisting arrest; criminal possession of stolen property; and obstructing governmental administration. Four were released on their own recognizance after local arraignment.

Caleb Eduardo Gomez-Sanchez, 35, was sentenced by a federal judge on April 10 to serve 324 months in prison. Gomez-Sanchez pleaded guilty on Sept. 13, 2021, to possession of methamphetamine with the intent to distribute.

During the nationwide operation, ERO deportation officers apprehended 216 unlawfully present noncitizens who have been convicted of drug trafficking or multiple drug possession related offenses involving methamphetamine, fentanyl, cocaine, heroin or synthetic drugs.

On April 8, ERO New York City arrested an unlawfully present citizen of Mexico and legal resident of Colombia upon his release from the U.S. Bureau of Prisons Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn.

ERO Boston apprehended a Dominican national convicted of drug trafficking felonies in three U.S. states. Deportation officers from ERO Boston’s Hartford field office arrested the 41-year-old March 21 in Meriden.

Eugene Edward Golden, 37, of Baltimore, pleaded guilty March 21 to conspiracy to commit sexual exploitation of a child and to two counts of sexual exploitation of a child in order to produce and transmit a visual depiction of the sexually explicit conduct.

Marco Jesus Perales, 27, of Carrizo Springs, was arrested June 30, 2020, and pleaded guilty to one count of distribution of child sexual abuse material on June 24, 2021. He was sentenced April 9 to 151 months in federal prison following his conviction.

ERO Boston arrested a Salvadoran national charged locally with assault and battery on a police officer, resisting arrest, and assault and battery on a family or household member.

Joseph Alex Hernandez, 27, of Austin, was sentenced on April 4 to 192 months for transporting noncitizens resulting in death and 120 months for being a felon in possession of a firearm. The two sentences will run concurrently. Hernandez pleaded guilty Oct. 23, 2023.

Enforcement and Removal Operations apprehended a Colombian noncitizen April 2 who was convicted of sex crimes against a California minor. Deportation officers from ERO Boston arrested the 23-year-old noncitizen sex offender in Revere.

Jorge Luis Martinez Frias, 38, is wanted in his native Mexico for homicide. He was transported Aug. 5 from Las Vegas, Nevada, via ground transportation, arriving the same day in San Diego at the San Ysidro Port of Entry. Upon arrival at the border, Tellez was turned over to the proper authorities in Mexico.

ICE ERO Miami deportation officers removed four undocumented noncitizens wanted by authorities for homicide and other offenses to the Dominican Republic April 2 on an ICE Air Operations charter flight.

ICE ERO Houston, with assistance from ERO El Salvador and the SAFE Task Force, removed Moises Antonio Chavez Figueroa, a 32-year-old unlawfully present Salvadoran fugitive, from the United States April 5.

ERO Philadelphia removed Stanford Jahmaal Omar Bastian, a citizen of the Bahamas with a final order of removal, to the Bahamas on March 26. Bastian is a foreign fugitive wanted by law enforcement authorities in the Bahamas for murder.

Oscar Efrain Zavala-Urrea, 23, a Salvadoran national residing in Silver Spring, received the 25-year prison sentence March 19 for his participation in a racketeering conspiracy that included a murder related to his activities as part of the notorious MS-13 street gang.

ERO Newark officers apprehended eight unlawfully present noncitizens with convictions for drug trafficking or multiple drug possession related offenses involving fentanyl, cocaine, heroin or synthetic drugs during a nationwide law enforcement effort between March 11 and March 26.

ICE ERO San Diego officers apprehended four unlawfully present noncitizens who have been convicted of drug trafficking or multiple drug possession related offenses involving methamphetamine, fentanyl, cocaine, heroin or synthetic drugs during a nationwide law enforcement effort that ran from March 11 through March 26.

Those included removal flights to Central America, Colombia, Ecuador, Ivory Coast, Mexico, Peru, Sierra Leone and Togo. If a noncitizen arrives and has no legal basis to remain in the United States they will be processed and removed quickly, consistent with U.S. law.

Director Lechleitner also met with Homeland Security Investigations special agents and Enforcement and Removal Operations officers in Allentown in a townhall.

April 7 marks the commemoration of the Rwandan genocide, where 500,000 to one million Rwandan lives were taken in a 100-day mass killing campaign directed at Rwanda’s minority Tutsi community. Moderate Hutus and others who opposed the killings were also killed during that period.

ICE continues to modernize the immigration system as resources allow to realize cost efficiencies across the operational landscape.

The Dominican national was admitted into the United States in October 2007 by U.S. Customs and Borders Protection.

The Indian national entered the United States Dec. 12, 2019, at Dulles International Airport in Dulles, Virginia, as a nonimmigrant visitor.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement leadership met with leaders from the Center for Immigration Studies today.

USBP in Eagle Pass, Texas, arrested the Colombian national on July 3, 2022, shortly after he unlawfully entered the United States. The USBP issued the noncitizen a notice to appear before a DOJ immigration judge and ERO enrolled the noncitizen into the Alternatives to Detention program.