Officers from the Texas Department of Public Safety made the recent arrest of two immigrants in South Texas. These individuals, who are considered fugitives, were apprehended after being stopped for traffic violations.
DPS troopers in Laredo stopped Junior Adalid Montoya-Alvarez, a 49-year-old truck driver from Honduras who had lawful permanent status in the United States, on February 12th.
Junior Adalid Montoya-Alvarez, 49, was detained on Feb. 12 in Laredo and charged with human smuggling after DPS troopers stopped his truck.
According to DPS, Montoya-Alvarez and several other immigrants fled the tractor-trailer into surrounding brush as it came to a halt.
Montoya-Alvarez was detained together with seven others, all of whom were from Guatemala and Mexico, and charged with human smuggling.
A Harris County warrant for sexual assault also listed him as wanted, according to officials.
Sexual assault of a child warrant
Armando Alonso-Cortez, a Mexican national aged 40, was apprehended on February 6th after DPS troopers in Sullivan City conducted a routine traffic stop.
According to the Department of Public Safety (DPS), Alonso-Cortez, who was wanted by the Alton Police Department for sexually assaulting a child, was deemed a flight risk. A warrant had been issued for his arrest.
Texas DPS is actively involved in Governor Greg Abbott’s Operation Lone Star, a state-funded initiative aimed at enhancing border security.
DPS law enforcement officers have been sent to the Texas-Mexico border as members of tactical strike teams. Their mission is to assist in the identification and apprehension of criminal immigrants who have entered the country unlawfully.
Since 2011, the state has invested more than $11 billion in enhancing border security, and it has also requested reimbursements from the federal government.
Ordered removed
On February 11, in Socorro, Texas, near El Paso, DPS troopers and special agents apprehended a criminal immigrant from Venezuela during a routine traffic stop.
According to a news release from the DPS, Carlos Daniel Espinoza-Arguello, 26, had a removal order from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) and was a person of interest in a DPS Criminal Investigations Division case for the sexual assault of a child.
After processing Espinoza-Arguello, ERO handed him over to DPS Special Agents for questioning. Following the interview, Espinoza-Arguello was arrested and later booked into the El Paso County Jail.
During the arrest, special agents from DPS and ERO agents discovered a stash house nearby. They apprehended two undocumented immigrants from Venezuela at the location.
