ICE Furious as 'Dangerous Sanctuary Policies' Allow Illegal Charged with Manslaughter To Flee to Mexico
It wasn’t a hit-and-run — until local officials let the suspect run to Mexico.
An illegal alien who was allegedly behind the wheel of a speeding Chrysler 300 when it crashed into a Ford Fusion on July 12 in Oregon, leaving one woman dead, was allowed to go free on bail because Washington County declined to honor an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainer, Fox News reported Wednesday.
And ICE officials are furious.
“It is a real slap in the face to the victim’s friends and family when criminal aliens, in this case a man who has caused the death of a woman and severe injuries to her husband, are released into the community due to dangerous sanctuary policies,” Nathalie Asher, Seattle field office director for ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations, said in an ICE news release Tuesday.
“How many lives have to be lost before politicians are more concerned about public safety than their own political agendas?”
With most of the country’s media wrapped up in the political agendas of Democrats in Washington and their attempts to oust the president, stories like this one from Oregon are still worth paying attention to.
The suspect in the crash was identified as 20-year-old Alejandro Maldonado-Hernandez, according to KGW in Portland.
Maldonado-Hernandez was street-racing another vehicle at the time of the crash, KGW reported.
He was arrested and charged with second-degree manslaughter, third degree assault and reckless driving. His injuries from the crash were minor, according to ICE.
The dead woman was identified as Janace Ator, 81. Her husband of 57 years, Patrick, was driving the couple’s vehicle when it was hit.
“When it was all over, I woke up and looked over at my wife. She wasn’t talking,” he told KPTV on Tuesday. “I felt her pulse and there was no pulse. In my head I said, ‘Lord, why don’t you take me too?’”
According to the ICE statement, agents lodged an immigration detainer for Maldonado-Hernandez on July 16, which would have ensured that he was held in custody.
However, according to Fox, local jails in Oregon haven’t honored ICE detainers since a 2014 court decision found that a woman’s rights had been violated by officials in Clackamas County who held her beyond her release date while her immigration status was investigated.
Maldonado-Hernandez was released on bail on Aug. 8, Fox reported. On Aug. 27, according to the ICE statement, agents learned that he had fled to Mexico to avoid prosecution. He remains at large, according to ICE.
Mary Ann Mendoza, an activist on behalf of families who lost loved ones to criminal activity by illegal aliens, took notice.
Mendoza’s son, Mesa, Arizona, police Sgt. Brandon Mendoza, was killed by an illegal alien driving the wrong way on a highway near Phoenix in 2014.
She was obviously outraged by the news about Oregon.
Jail deputies ignored a detainer filed by I.C.E. and released him. He had originally been booked on charges of Manslaughter, Assault, and Reckless Driving, after he plowed into a car while street racing, killing the other driver. He fled to Mexico ?https://t.co/C9AK1Hosvd
— Angel Mom Mary Ann Mendoza ⭐️ (@mamendoza480) November 17, 2019
And she had plenty of company.
Sadly, this is what Oregon voters voted for.
— Innocent Human Life Matters (@ThreeDogs58) November 17, 2019
Every day, every week, every month, and every year, illegal aliens victimize the citizens of the United States with the assistance of the Democrats!
— Jay Lines (@NAVLERET) November 17, 2019
I don’t know about the rest of you but I feel like we’re watching a movie we can’t stop. It’s literally criminal what some of these cities and stares are doing. Smh! Death by a million little cuts….. by our own politicians to boot.
— ArgonautDad (@ArgonautDad) November 17, 2019
That last one nails it.
Stories like this, about mundane breakdowns in the American justice system, are easy to lose in the high-drama, constitutional confrontation going on in the nation’s capital now over the impeachment hearings and their strange cast of characters.
But the fact that during the Obama administration vast numbers of Americans got tired of seeing laws go unenforced, and criminals actually released, is one reason President Donald Trump is in the White House today.
The fact that local officials still refuse to honor ICE holders, even if it means suspected rapists and other violent criminals will go free is a crime against the law-abiding segment of the American population (which is to say, the vast majority).
If counties in Oregon or other liberal jurisdictions feel free to disregard ICE detainers on illegal immigrants with a law-and-order president like Trump in the White House, imagine what the country will look like if he’s replaced by someone jumping out of the clown car of candidates seeking the Democratic nomination for 2020.
The whole country might have reasons to be running then.
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