(Luis Cornelio, Headline USA) A federal immigration agency suggested on Friday that an order from DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas inherently blocked the removal proceedings of an illegal immigrant years before he would face murder charges in the death of a teen in Mobile County, Alabama.
The illegal alien in question, Antonio Antonio-Rodas, a Guatemalan national, is facing murder charges after allegedly driving his vehicle at 88 miles per hour before crashing into the vehicle of 19-year-old Adam Luker. The teen died a week after the crash.
ICE told the Daily Caller that Antonio-Rodas had not been deported, despite being convicted of a previous crime, because of Mayorkas’s directive to prioritize the removal of illegal immigrants with more severe crimes.
The Biden-led immigration agency said that Antonio-Rodas entered the U.S. unlawfully at an unknown date and location and was arrested on Dec. 27, 2018. At that time, Border Patrol served Antonio-Rodas with a Notice to Appear order.
He was subsequently released on Jan. 4, 2019.
Nearly three years after, in November 2021, Antonio-Rodas was arrested and convicted for driving under the influence.
Despite the conviction, ICE did not prioritize his deportation due to Mayorkas’s Sept. 30, 2021 directive, which instructed immigration officials to use “prosecutorial discretion” in deciding who should be removed from the U.S., the Caller reported.
ICE also cited the COVID-19 pandemic to excuse its failure to remove Antonio-Rodas, who would later allegedly go on to kill a 19-year-old.
An attorney for Luker’s family, Will Phillips, said that their beloved son would still be alive had Antonio-Rodas been removed from the U.S.
“If that had been the case, then this would have never happened,” he said. “You know, the federal government has access to all of the, you know, information about arrests and that kind of thing.”
The Semmes Police Department did not respond to Headline USA’s calls seeking information about when Antonio-Rodas is scheduled to appear before a judge.
