ERO New Orleans arrests Honduran national following violation in state court order
NEW ORLEANS — Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) New Orleans supported the U.S. Marshals Service in apprehending a 19-year-old Honduran national in New Orleans on June 29.
The Kenner Police Department arrested the illegally present noncitizen in September 2022 for a firearms violation. When officials determined that he was illegally present in the United States, U.S. Border Patrol transferred him to ERO New Orleans custody. ERO detained him at the Central Louisiana ICE Processing Center during his immigration proceedings, and an immigration judge ordered him removed from the United States on Dec. 19, 2022.
While the noncitizen was in custody, an ICE deportation officer connected him to the alias of a person wanted by the New Orleans Police Department on homicide charges. Records revealed that the police had identified him as a person of interest in a homicide investigation and had a warrant for him.
ERO New Orleans and ICE’s Office of the Principal Legal Advisor collaborated with the New Orleans assistant district attorney’s office to ensure that after criminal prosecution, the noncitizen would be returned to ERO New Orleans for removal.
On Jan. 27, 2023, New Orleans police took the noncitizen into custody on the warrant. Despite negotiating a custody agreement with ICE in May 2023, Orleans Parish failed to follow the state court’s order to release him to ERO New Orleans upon conclusion of criminal proceedings.
“With this arrest, even when a court order for cooperation with our agency was not followed, our immigration enforcement team and law enforcement partners worked together,” said ERO New Orleans Field Office Director Mellissa Harper. “ERO will continue to assist the United States Marshals Service’s Gulf Coast Regional Task Force to uphold public safety.”
Noncitizens placed into removal proceedings receive their legal due process from federal immigration judges in the immigration courts, which are administered by the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) within the Department of Justice. EOIR is a separate entity from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Immigration judges in these courts make decisions based on the merits of each individual case, determining if a noncitizen is removable or eligible for certain forms of relief from removal. Once a noncitizen is subject to a final order of removal issued by an immigration judge or other lawful means, ERO officers carry out the removal decisions made by the federal immigration judges.
In fiscal year 2022, ERO arrested 46,396 noncitizens with criminal histories. This group had 198,498 associated charges and convictions, including 21,531 assault offenses; 8,164 sex and sexual assault offenses; 5,554 weapons offenses; 1,501 homicide-related offenses; and 1,114 kidnapping offenses.
As one of ICE’s three operational directorates, ERO is the principal federal law enforcement authority in charge of domestic immigration enforcement. ERO’s mission is to protect the homeland through the arrest and removal of those who undermine the safety of U.S. communities and the integrity of U.S. immigration laws, and its primary areas of focus are interior enforcement operations, management of the agency’s detained and non-detained populations, and repatriation of noncitizens who have received final orders of removal. ERO’s workforce consists of more than 7,700 law enforcement and non-law enforcement support personnel across 25 domestic field offices and 208 locations nationwide, 30 overseas postings, and multiple temporary duty travel assignments along the border.
Learn more about ICE’s mission to increase public safety in your community, on Twitter @ERONewOrleans.
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