Free Republic

Five men found slain last week in a north Shelby County apartment were beaten and shocked. Investigators believe that on Aug. 17 - three days before the discovery - the men were beaten and tortured with electric shocks, and their throats were cut, the sheriff said. in a brutal murder-for-hire related to drugs and money, authorities said Tuesday. Four men have been charged with capital murder in the slayings, which Shelby County Sheriff Chris Curry described during a news conference as being connected to a drug organization that transports cocaine, methamphetamine and marijuana. All the suspects either received or paid...

There are a few things we can rule out as the cause of this trend. As far as science has learned, you do not get AIDS from: Living "in a new environment"Being "discriminated against" or "living in harsh conditions" Now that that is out of the way, I have another solution. If you make the choice to break into this country, you don't already have AIDS, and you want to avoid infection, avoid the following: "sex with a prostitute in California" (pretty much anywhere, really)"sex while using drugs or drinking""sex with another man" (unless you are a woman, and it's...

God Bless Texas! The Lone Star State has done the world a favor by disposing of a piece of human garbage that raped and brutally murdered two teenage girls. What makes this even sweeter is Texas did it in defiance of the International Court of Justice (is that the one Aquaman and Wonder Woman are on?), the Mexican government (the murderer-rapist was a Mexican), the Organization of American States, and a sobbing clutch of bed-wetting, criminal loving "human rights" activists and lawyers. Here's a quote from the article for those who want a good belly laugh: David Fathi of Human...

Andre Luiz de Castro Martins was in and out of court more than a dozen times in the past six years for charges including assault and battery with a car, malicious destruction of property, and threatening to kill his girlfriend. Most recently, he had been charged Friday for driving without a license. It was the fourth time since 2002 that he had been charged for driving without a license. Another time, he had been charged with driving on a suspended license. Links Gunfire felled Brazilian man But despite a history of run-ins with the law and having overstayed a tourist...

Harlingen woman who was in a coma for a week after a hit and run accident has died Harlingen - The family of twenty two year old Christina Agado says she lost her fight to stay alive last night. She had been hospitalized following a hit & run accident in Harlingen, a week ago. The suspect, eighteen year old Mario Alberto Garza, is in the Cameron County Jail. He's been charged with Failure to stop and render aid, a third degree felony. Investigators on the case tell NEWSCHANNEL 5, for now it does not appear that he will face a...

DALY CITY -- A San Francisco man is expected to be charged with murder Tuesday in San Mateo County Superior Court for allegedly stabbing a fellow patron at a Daly City restaurant after the victim made crass comments about a waitress, police said. Both Jesus Hernandez, 33, and Carlos Padilla-Ovedio, 25, were at the Durango restaurant about 5 p.m. Friday when Hernandez apparently began making "rude comments to the female waitress," police Lt. Jay Morena said. Both men were "semi-regulars" at the small restaurant, Morena said. After hearing Hernandez's comments, Padilla-Ovedio stabbed him in the torso and ran out the...

The trial of a woman charged in a fatal school bus crash has been moved from Marshall to Willmar. Lyon County District Judge David Peterson granted the change of venue Wednesday. He also scheduled the trial of Olga Marina Franco del Cid of Minneota to begin July 28 at the Kandiyohi County courthouse. Four children from Lakeview School in Cottonwood died when a van ran a stop sign and hit their bus Feb. 19. Prosecutors say Franco, 34, was driving the van, but she claims it was her boyfriend. He hasn't been found. In his order Wednesday, the judge wrote...

The lawyer for Olga Franco, the woman charged in the fatal Cottonwood, Minn school bus crash, has filed a motion demanding a speedy trial for his client. Olga Marina Franco del Cid, of Minneota, has been in the Lyon County Jail since her arrest on February 20. Franco is charged with four counts of criminal vehicular homicide in the deaths of brother Hunter and Jesse Javens, Reed Stevens, an Emilee Olson. In filing the motion, attorney Manuel Guerrero cites the length of Franco’s jail stay, and says prosecutors have failed to return phone calls and provide him with their evidence...

The lawyer for Olga Marina Franco del Cid wants a change of venue. Manuel Guerrero filed notice with the Lyon County District Court Administrator's office. Franco is charged with four counts of criminal vehicular homicide for the deaths of four students on February 19. Prosecutors say Franco was driving a minivan on Lyon County Road 24. According to the complaint, she blew through a stop sign and hit the bus. Franco apparently doesn't have a driver's license. Immigration and Customs Exchange officials also say Franco is in the country illegally and used a false identity while in the U.S. During...

KEARNEY — A Guatemala man has been sentenced to 20 to 32 years in prison for stabbing his girlfriend and her sister in their northwest Kearney apartment. Mauro Yos-Chiguil pleaded guilty in March to second-degree murder and felony second-degree assault charges in Buffalo County Court. Authorities have said the 33-year-old Yos-Chiguil stabbed his girlfriend and mother of his twin sons in her head, shoulder, chest and stomach. She was released after treatment at a local hospital. Also injured was the girlfriend’s teenage sister. After he completes his sentence, Yos-Chiguil could face deportation. Authorities have said he is an illegal immigrant.

The way Olga Franco tells it, she was a passenger the afternoon of Feb. 19, heading toward work in Cottonwood and arguing with her boyfriend, who was behind the wheel, when she saw the school bus. She yelled at him to be careful, but the van's brakes weren't working well, she said, and they went through the intersection and into the bus. Franco is now charged with criminal vehicular homicide in the deaths of four schoolchildren who were on the bus and has become a flashpoint in the debate on undocumented immigrants. Speaking publicly Tuesday for the first time, Franco,...

Family members of the woman charged with causing the fatal school bus crash last month near Cottonwood say she left her native Guatemala two years earlier, hoping to make a better life for her family. The parents of Olga Franco tell the St. Paul Pioneer Press that she was sending them small amounts of money to help supplement about five dollars a day they earn growing corn. Franco is charged with four counts of criminal vehicular homicide in the crash that killed four students aged 9 to 13. Family members recall her as a loving daughter who helped care for...

U.S. Representative Michele Bachmann has written to U.S. immigration officials to determine how an illegal immmigrant allegedly was able to cause last week's fatal school bus crash in Cottonwood. Bachmann asks the assistant secretary of Homeland Security in charge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Julie Myers, how federal and local law enforcement can ensure such a thing never happens again. Bachmann also raises questions with ICE about the suspect, Olga Martinez Franco, who had gone by the alias Alianiss Morales. A woman using that name was ticketed for driving without a license in Montevideo in 2006. Bachmann says she wants...

5 EYEWITNESS NEWS has uncovered information on the driver of the van that hit the school bus. 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS has learned through state license records and state staff that the driver of the van does not have a valid driver's license. Alianiss Morales, of Motevideo, was convicted of driving without a license two years ago, according to police and Chippewa County Court administration staff. Morales was pulled over, according to the clerk of court's office, after a report of an an erratic driver. The officer found she was driving in Motevideo without a license. The Minnesota State Patrol will...

Costs public thousands in care An illegal immigrant from Mexico with tuberculosis cost the public thousands of dollars in unreimbursed health care this past year after Yavapai County Community Health Services workers spent two months overseeing the patient's TB care before the patient died of other medical complications. County officials estimate that it cost somewhere between $5,305 to $8,564 to care for the patient and to test the people who came in contact with the person. If any of those people eventually come down with TB, the cost to the county will increase. County officials said because the person -...

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) -- A 14-year-old boy who fled to Mexico with his former teacher will be allowed to return to the United States for a year, his lawyer said Thursday. The Department of Homeland Security has granted the boy, an illegal immigrant, humanitarian parole, according to a letter sent to his lawyer, Amy Peck. "(The boy) is going home,'' Peck told reporters. "At the very least, he gets to speak about what happened to him.'' Marilu Cabrera, a spokeswoman for Citizenship and Immigration Services, said she couldn't comment on specific immigration cases. The boy's former teacher, Kelsey Peterson, 25,...

The Montgomery County Council yesterday proposed legislation that would require domestic workers and their employers to sign contracts to ensure that the workers receive fair wages, overtime and other protections against abuse. Council members Marc Elrich and George Leventhal, both at-large Democrats, proposed the legislation, which they called the first of its kind in the nation. It would allow workers who spend at least 20 hours a week as housekeepers, nannies or adult-care attendants to negotiate their work conditions and pay. The lawmakers said a written contract would offer protection for workers, most of them immigrant women, who are vulnerable...

A Chicago church is again in the spotlight in the debate over immigrant rights. Illegal immigrant Elvira Arellano (el-VEE'-ruh ah-ray-AH'-noh) took sanctuary in the Adalberto United Methodist Church for a year before she was arrested on a visit to Los Angeles and deported last August. Now, another illegal immigrant, Flor Crisostomo (floor kree-SOHS'-toh-moh), has defied a deportation order and taken refuge in the same church. Crisostomo is an illegal immigrant from Mexico arrested at a workplace raid at a Chicago site of IFCO Systems in 2006. The 28-year-old told reporters at the church Monday that she chose to defy authorities...

Ariz. takes aim at migrant 'drop houses' By JACQUES BILLEAUD, Associated Press Writer 47 minutes ago State officials are picking new targets in their efforts to stop illegal immigration in Arizona: the "drop houses" where human smugglers hold customers until they pay up. Gov. Janet Napolitano, addressing the opening day of the Legislature on Monday, said the state should go after property managers who knowingly rent homes to smugglers. "Strengthen the law, so we can get to that middleman," said the Democratic governor, who offered no specific suggestions on how the state should hold such rental agents accountable. Napolitano posted...

Marcelino Benitez said his best academic year was 12th grade. He got all A's and B's, learned to install heating and air-conditioning systems and won a college scholarship. But unlike many of his classmates, he dreaded graduation. After that ceremony, the Mexican immigrant had a diploma from Virginia but still lacked the other documents he needed to make his way in the United States.... For illegal immigrants, public school is a rare refuge. There's no requirement to prove legal immigration status to enroll. But the transition into the adult world can be abrupt. About 65,000 illegal immigrants graduate from U.S....

Raisinet Theory on Immigration The political obfuscation of the phrase "back of the line".... Consider hundreds of people waiting in line for a new hit movie. They've been waiting outside the theater for hours in the cold pouring rain. Along come a bunch of people who sneak in the back door of the movie theater and sit down in front of the big screen. The manager of the theater knows that it's unfair, but instead of kicking them out and making them get in the back of the line outside in the rain, he stipulates that as punishment for cutting...

SAN DIEGO -- There was a surprise in a downtown San Diego courtroom Thursday, as an illegal immigrant changed his plea and admitted to luring a boy into a canyon near a school and raping him. [...] Nava pleaded guilty to committing a lewd act by force on a child under 14, admitted to being a stranger to the child when the crime was committed, and acknowledged that the act involved force and or fear to the child, prosecutors said.

Anyone watching this guy on FBC right now... spouting off on how Americans were duped across the land with fear regarding the illegal invasion taking place across our borders, supporting Spitzer and saying that his plan was not even enough..... BOILING!

In response to an email plea to scores of organizations strongly opposed to illegal immigration, and the presence of illegal immigrants in our nation, asking these organizations to pool their resources and take our grievances to Congress, many responded. The suggested strategy was simple. Have a single nationwide petition campaign, with all petitions written exactly the same. Have a nationwide day when Citizens will assemble peaceably at district offices of all members of the House of Representatives. Present the petitions of grievances to the Representative, or duly appointed staff member for a redress of grievances. All response were positive. Most...

Redwood City -- A day laborer was convicted today of second-degree murder for beating a suspected human smuggler to death with a plank of wood after a drunken brawl in San Mateo in 2004. Cesar King, 28, clenched his jaw, blinked repeatedly and then took off his glasses to wipe his eyes as the verdict was read in San Mateo County Superior Court. King, who earlier this week moaned, grunted and gasped for air while testifying on the witness stand, stood with his hands folded in front of him and turned around to watch the 12 jurors file out of...

CHICAGO -- A Mexican immigrant filed a $30 million federal lawsuit against suburban Carpentersville, claiming paramedics denied her son care because of anti-immigrant sentiment in the village. Gloria Lopez, 28, said on Sept. 18, 2006, she left her son, Osbiel, then 4 months old, with a baby sitter who didn't speak English. The baby sitter, Esther Carrera, called 911 when the baby had trouble breathing. But fire department paramedics allegedly said the boy was having stomach problems and gave her a form to sign declining care, which Carrera didn't understand, according to the lawsuit filed Thursday in U.S. District Court...

The man who shot and killed a Phoenix police officer before he himself later was fatally shot by authorities was an illegal entrant, a federal official said Wednesday. Erik Jovani Martinez, 22, was in the country illegally last year when he was arrested and convicted on theft charges, said Vinnie Picard, a spokesman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. He said Martinez was deported on March 3 last year, and at some point re-entered the country illegally. Mayor Phil Gordon called Martinez a "poster child" for failed federal efforts to tighten border security. "I have a message for the federal government....

An illegal immigrant who's been deported five times will be facing the death penalty for a Phoenix murder. Demetro Acosta-Uribe is accused of shooting Ivan Santos to death earlier this year. According to police reports the Santos's body was found in May, 2007 in the front yard of a west Phoenix home. The victim had been shot to death after he was bound and his head covered in plastic wrap. Two other men were also found on the property, restrained in the same manner. Neither had been shot, but one of the victims would have suffocated had a neighbor not...

Thursday, September 13, 2007 WON'T THIS WOMAN JUST PLEASE SHUT THE HELL UP? I happened on a television yesterday .. and tuned in Fox News for a moment. There she was, Elvira Arellano, the fugitive criminal alien who was deported to Mexico last month. Now Elvira has decided just who to blame for her troubles. You do remember Elvira, don't you? She's the Mexican criminal alien who was deported from the U.S. once, and then sneaked back in, stole a Social Security number and then stole a job from a legal American worker. She then hid in some storefront church...

(AP) MEXICO The Mexican government said Tuesday it is talking with U.S. officials about whether a deported illegal migrant and activist could return to the United States. Elvira Arellano was arrested and sent back to her native Mexico last month after taking refuge in a Chicago church for a year to avoid a deportation order. Mexican Foreign Secretary Patricia Espinosa said she approached U.S. authorities on Arellano's behalf after the 32-year-old asked Mexican President Felipe Calderon to help her return to the United States legally as a "peace and justice" ambassador. Espinosa did not say whether Mexico planned to give...

MEXICO CITY (AP) - Lawmakers in Mexico are getting involved in the case of an illegal immigrant who was deported by the United States. A Mexican Senate committee is urging President Felipe Calderon (fay-LEE'-pay kahl-duh-ROHN') to send a diplomatic note protesting the deportation of Elvira Arellano (el-VEE'-ruh ah-ray-AH'-noh). She's the activist who had taken refuge in a Chicago church for a year. The committee also approved a scholarship to help her 8-year-old U.S.-born son, Saul, who is staying in the United States. Arellano became a national symbol for illegal immigrant parents by defying her deportation order and speaking out from...

Alejandro Rivera Gamboa, an illegal immigrant from Mexico, was arrested four times on drunken driving charges in Oregon. But until police charged him last week with choking the life from a 15-year-old girl, immigration authorities had never heard his name. Juan Lizcano had at least two run-ins with the law in Texas. Both went unnoticed by immigration officials until Lizcano, who entered the country illegally in 2001, was charged with killing Dallas Police Officer Brian Jackson in 2005. In New Brunswick, Ricardo Cepates, an illegal immigrant from Honduras, already had an outstanding deportation order when he was arrested for holding...

For the first time, the Mercury News was invited along to watch as the arrests were made, an effort by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement to show Bay Area media the inner workings of a growing national crackdown on immigrants who are deportable because of criminal convictions, and others who have been ordered deported. The invitation came months after a comprehensive immigration reform bill was stymied in Congress and weeks after federal authorities announced they would step up enforcement of current laws by punishing businesses that hire illegal immigrants. Critics of the program said thousands of illegal immigrants who have...

One of six men charged with the execution-style killings of three college students in Newark, N.J., said yesterday in Prince George's County District Court that he will fight extradition to New Jersey. "I want to stay here and fight it," said Rodolfo Godinez, 24, a Nicaraguan national who was arrested Saturday in Oxon Hill. Judge Leo E. Green Jr. ordered Mr. Godinez held without bail until a hearing Sept. 20. Mr. Godinez's half-brother Alexander Alfaro, 16, who is being held in the Prince William County jail in Woodbridge, declined to waive extradition yesterday...He will be held pending a court hearing...

"Activist arrested in L.A.: Deported to Tijuana, pastor says." That's the headline for an August 20 Chicago Tribune story on convicted Social Security fraudster and serial border-jumper Elvira Arellano. Reporter Antonio Olivo mentioned the conviction, but deep in the article in the 14th paragraph: Much of the anger from across the political spectrum surrounding illegal immigration has been crystallized by Arellano's story. After entering the country illegally twice, she became an activist shortly after she was arrested in 2002 during a federal sweep at O'Hare International Airport, where Arellano cleaned airplanes. She was later convicted of using a fake Social...

Deported: Church Sanctuary-Seeking Immigration Activist Sent Back to Mexico LOS ANGELES (AP) - An illegal immigrant who took refuge in a Chicago church for a year to avoid being separated from her U.S.-born son has been deported to Mexico, the church's pastor said.

Los Angeles (AP) -- An illegal immigrant who took refuge in a Chicago church for a year to avoid being separated from her U.S.-born son has been deported to Mexico, the church's pastor and immigration officials said. Elvira Arellano became an activist and a national symbol for illegal immigrant parents as she defied her deportation order and spoke out from her religious sanctuary. She held a news conference last week to announce that she would finally leave the church to try to lobby U.S. lawmakers for change. She was arrested Sunday outside Our Lady Queen of Angels church in Los...

The man accused of running a stop sign and causing a crash this week that killed a 17-year-old Port Washington boy is an illegal immigrant who was convicted in Wisconsin in December of first-offense drunken driving, authorities confirmed Friday. A criminal complaint charging Eddie Carbajal-Lile with hit and run resulting in death also indicates that he consumed five or six beers before the crash Tuesday that killed Paul Watry. Prosecutors would have needed evidence such as a blood test showing he was intoxicated at the time of the crash to charge Carbajal-Lile with homicide by intoxicated use of a motor...

The investigation into the execution-style murder of three college students took a shocking turn Friday afternoon with a report that two of the victims may have been sexually assaulted before they were killed. FOX 5 New York reported that a sexual attack may have occurred before college students Terrance Aeriel, Iofemi Hightower and Dashon Harvey were shot to death, and 19-year old Natasha Aerial was critically wounded. Authorities charged a third suspect with three counts of felony murder in the killings Friday evening, according to an Associated Press report. The suspect was described as a 15-year-old boy by Essex County...

Latino Man, 31, Surrenders in N.J. Students' Execution-Style Murders Thursday, August 09, 2007 By Heather Scroope E-MAIL STORY PRINTER FRIENDLY VERSION Aug. 6: Terrance Aeriel was one of three college students killed in an execution-style shooting in Newark, N.J. Aug. 6: Terrance Aeriel was one of three college students killed in an execution-style shooting in Newark, N.J. NEWARK, N.J. — DEVELOPING STORY: A 31-year-old Latino man surrendered in connection with the execution-style killings of three college students in New Jersey, officials said. Jose Carranza, 31, whose fingerprint was lifted from a bottle, turned himself in on Thursday afternoon. Mayor Cory...

Two cousins accused of killing a teenager during her visit to Oregon acknowledged entering the country illegally from Mexico. This is from a federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement official. The Oregonian reports 24-year-old Alejandro Rivera Gamboa went unnoticed by immigration officials even though he was arrested four times on drunken driving charges since 2000.

LONDON (AFP) - Authorities were still hunting Monday for 14 illegal immigrants, all convicted criminals, who escaped from a detention centre. Twenty-six men went on the run from the Campsfield House Immigration Detention Centre in Oxfordshire, southern England, on Saturday after detainees started fires and broke out. Police officers in riot gear were called in to deal with the blaze, while helicopters and dogs have been used in the hunt for those still at large. Police have rounded up 12 of those who fled, but 14 remain on the run and the Home Office has warned that they are all...

Even as Sen. Barack Obama found himself under fire from the Hillary Clinton campaign over what she called his "naive" intention to meet with leaders of countries hostile to the U.S., the presidential hopeful praised the recent court decision overturning one city's attempt to protect itself from hostile foreigners filling their streets with drugs, crime and gangs as "a victory for all Americans." On Thursday, U.S. District Judge James Munley overturned Hazleton, Pa.'s "Illegal Immigration Relief Act" in a 206-page opinion that declared states and municipalities have no authority to stem illegal immigration.

A man who was in the United States illegally was sentenced today to 48 months in prison for his role in a fatal vehicle crash that killed a Kenyon, Minn., man earlier this year. Dakota County Court Judge Karen Asphaug handed down the punishment to Antonio Alatorre-Garcia, 25, who pleaded guilty June 12 to one count of criminal vehicular homicide. Alatorre-Garcia, who is from Mexico, was living in Minneapolis when he was involved in a two-vehicle accident Feb. 17 that killed Mark Berkeland, 56. According to a records, Berkeland, a U.S. Postal Service employee, was on his way to work...

A 27-year-old Eagan man has been sentenced to nearly five years in prison for purposely crashing his minivan into another vehicle, killing a 72-year-old woman from Apple Valley. Juan Canizal's minivan crashed into the car driven by Carmen Espersen she drove through Eagan on Highway 13. Just before the crash, authorities said Canizal told his passenger that he was going to kill himself. Canizal survived the crash. He pleaded guilty to criminal vehicular homicide on Monday in Dakota County District Court. Dakota County District Judge Kathryn Messerich sentenced him to four years and nine months in prison -- nine months...

"I disgraced myself, and my mother deserves a better son than me.” Terapon Adhahn said those words to a counselor 17 years ago, during treatment for a sex offense he admitted committing. What he said to Tacoma police Thursday is unknown, but information from Adhahn, 42, led investigators to the body of 12-year-old Zina Linnik, missing since July 4. "It is with great regret and sorrow that I am informing our community that we have located the body of Zina Linnik," Tacoma Police Chief Don Ramsdell said Thursday, Ramsdell provided little more information, saying only that Linnik’s body was found...

HAMILTON — An illegal immigrant previously convicted of a sex offense and deported back to Mexico was arrested Tuesday in Butler County. A tip led Butler County Sheriff's deputies to Jose Valenzuela, 37, living in the 1200 block of Pater Avenue in Hamilton. Valenzuela was convicted in 1998 of gross sexual imposition involving a juvenile girl and was deemed a sexually oriented offender by the court, according to the sheriff's office. He was required to register with the sheriff's office annually for 10 years, but in 2004, the U.S. Immigration and Custom Enforcement office deported him. Deputies received information that...

An 18-year-old man on Wednesday was deported to Mexico after being convicted of sexually assaulting a 3-year-old girl at his family's daycare center. Reyes Salazar-Clara on June 13 was convicted of second-degree criminal sexual conduct. Salazar-Clara is a citizen of Mexico who illegally entered the United States in June 2005, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said. The deportation is part of the agency's Operation Predator, a four-year initiative aimed at those who sexually exploit children. According to a criminal complaint, police were called to the Hennepin County Medical Center on Feb. 21, where they found a 3-year-old girl suffering from...

After weeks of trying to prevent a Twin Cities suburban mom from being deported, a family learns on Wednesday that Sara Munoz Gonzalez has lost her battle to stay in the United States. Her husband, Nixon Avandano, consoled his five children moments after the family was told that Gonzalez is on her way back to Mexico. Her husband is here legally, living with their U.S. born children in St. Michael, Minn. The family was not allowed to say goodbye before she boarded the plane. "All we ask is for our Mom to come back, that's it. But I can tell...

California Republican Party Chairman Ron Nehring faced sharp criticism Monday in the wake of the state GOP's immigration scandal involving its former top financial officer who resigned Sunday after news surfaced of his battle with U.S. immigration authorities to remain in the country. The party's board of directors hired Bill Christensen, a former statewide executive director of Victory 2006 -- a committee that aids Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's fundraising efforts -- on Monday to fill the top GOP financial post temporarily. Christensen's appointment came after Michael Kamburowski, 35, an Australian native, resigned as the state party's chief operating officer. The Chronicle...