- Carlos Daniel Carillo-Lopez, an illegal alien from Guatemala, allegedly participated in the gang murder of a teenager in a Washington state suburban town.
- Before his arrest for murder, Carillo-Lopez was arrested on local charges numerous times, but every single detainer request lodged by ICE was ignored by authorities. Washington Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee recently signed a bill into law that prohibits authorities from cooperating with ICE.
- Carillo-Lopez arrived in the country illegally as a child in 2015, part of the surge of unaccompanied alien children who arrived en masse at the southern border at the time.
An illegal alien who was repeatedly arrested and released from custody in a sanctuary town in Washington state now stands accused of murdering a teenager.
Carlos Daniel Carillo-Lopez, a Guatemalan citizen who illegally entered the United States, is accused of taking part in a gang murder of a teenager. The murder allegation comes after Carillo-Lopez was arrested several times in the state, but allowed to be released after numerous detainer requests lodged by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) were ignored.
The Washington Times broke the story on Carillo-Lopez’s repeated release from custody in Washington, a state that largely prohibits local law enforcement from working with federal immigration authorities.
ICE identified Carillo-Lopez as an associate of the Crossroads Locos 13, a Latino gang with a long history of violence in the Seattle area. He allegedly was involved in a murder of a teenager at a local park who was believed to have belonged to a rival gang. He originally claimed that he left the park before the violence began, according to the Washington Times. However, investigators eventually were able to place him at the scene of the crime. (RELATED: DHS Chief ‘Not Surprised’ Protesters Would Not Let Him Speak At Immigration Conference)
“This is yet again another example of sanctuary policies shielding criminal aliens who prey on people in their own and other communities from immigration enforcement. As Carillo-Lopez’s crimes increased in severity, local officials chose to release him, time and time again, over immigration detainers that could have taken him off the streets,” ICE spokeswoman Tanya Roman said in a statement provided to the Daily Caller News Foundation on Thursday.
Carillo-Lopez, a 19-year-old, touted an extensive criminal rap sheet before getting booked on murder and robbery charges.
He was arrested on March 15 by the Bellevue Police Department on local charges and booked into the South Correctional Entity Jail (SCORE). ICE lodged a detainer request soon after his arrest. However, that request was ignored and he was released from custody afterward, according to agency.
The Bellevue Police Department again arrested Carillo-Lopez for local charges on April 4 and booked him into SCORE. Federal immigration authorities lodged a detainer request, but, once again, SCORE ignored and did not honor the request and released him on an unspecified date. The same thing happened just 14 days later when Carillo-Lopez was arrested on April 18.
The Bellevue Police Department arrested Carillo-Lopez again on June 9, but this time sent him into King County Jail in Seattle, Washington. But like the previous detention center, King County Jail ignored the detainer request lodged by ICE, and he was released from custody without any notification to the agency.
police lights. (Shutterstock/Tiko Aramyan)
On Sept. 30, the King County Sheriff’s Office arrested Carillo-Lopez on homicide and robbery charges. He has been detained in King County Jail since Oct. 10, according to inmate records. ICE has lodged a detainer request with the facility, but it’s not clear if they will honor it this time around.
“ICE maintains that cooperation by local law enforcement is an indispensable component of promoting public safety. It’s unfortunate that current local and state laws and policies tie the hands of local law enforcement agencies that want and need to work with ICE to promote public safety by holding criminals accountable and providing justice and closure for their victims,” Roman continued in her statement to the DCNF.
A detainer request is filed by ICE when a suspected illegal alien is placed into custody at a local or state detention facility. The detainer asks that the facility or law enforcement agency notify ICE in advance if they plan on releasing the individual, and also asks that they maintain custody of the individual to allow ICE to assume custody.
However, a growing number of Democratic-led states, cities, and other localities are enacting laws that forbid law enforcement personnel from cooperating with ICE, which includes ignoring their detainer requests.
Mexican citizens fleeing violence, camp in a queue to try to cross into the U.S. to apply for asylum at Cordova-Americas border crossing bridge in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, Sept. 22, 2019. REUTERS/Jose Luis Gonzalez
Washington state is no stranger to “sanctuary” policies. Washington Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee signed a bill into law in May that explicitly forbids jails and state prisons from honoring detainer requests or from alerting the agency if suspected illegal aliens are to be released from custody. The law also forbids law enforcement from asking about an individual’s immigration status or place of birth, with limited exceptions.
King County, which encompasses Seattle and suburb town of Bellevue, has long had sanctuary laws on the books. The Council of King County passed an ordinance in 2009 that prohibits county law enforcement from enforcing federal immigration law. The Immigration Reform Law Institute recently named Seattle as one of the “worst sanctuary communities” in the entire United States.
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