ERO Baltimore arrests previously removed 18th Street gang member charged with crimes in El Salvador

BALTIMORE — On Nov. 7, Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) Baltimore apprehended an undocumented noncitizen in Cockeysville. The noncitizen is a member of the notorious 18th Street criminal gang who was previously removed from the United States. Deportation officers from ERO Baltimore’s Fugitive Operations Team arrested the 37-year-old Salvadoran national, who has been charged by authorities in El Salvador with crimes relating to public peace, illicit groups and illegally carrying a firearm.

“This Salvadoran noncitizen represented a threat to the residents of Maryland,” said ERO Baltimore acting Field Office Director Darius Reeves. “He is a documented member of a violent street gang using our communities to hide out from authorities in his home country. ERO Baltimore will not allow the world’s criminals to use Maryland neighborhoods to escape justice.”
The undocumented noncitizen unlawfully entered the United States on an unknown date at an unknown location without being inspected, admitted or paroled by an immigration official.

U.S. Border Patrol arrested the Salvadoran national near Cotulla, Texas, in May 2011 and served him with an expedited removal form. The next month, it transferred him to ERO Houston for removal. ERO Houston removed the noncitizen from the United States to El Salvador in July 2011.

The San Salvador Police Department arrested and charged the Salvadoran national for crimes relating to public peace, illicit groups and illegally carrying a firearm in July 2013 and identified him a member of the 18th Street criminal gang at that time.

The San Salvador Police Department again arrested and charged the Salvadoran citizen for illegally carrying a firearm in November 2015.

He unlawfully reentered the United States on an unknown date at an unknown location without being inspected, admitted or paroled by an immigration official.

In March 2021, U.S. Border Patrol encountered the Salvadoran national, his spouse and child near Hidalgo, Texas. They processed him under prosecutorial discretion and released him, his spouse and child that day.

The noncitizen filed an application for asylum and for withholding of removal with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services in May 2022. A Department of Justice immigration judge in Baltimore rejected his application the following month.

In February 2023, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services officially closed the noncitizen’s case, reinstating his removal.

Deportation officers from ERO Baltimore’s Fugitive Operations Team arrested him at his residence in Cockeysville and served him a notice of intent/decision to reinstate prior removal order. The Salvadoran national will remain in ICE custody pending his removal from the United States.

ERO conducts removals of individuals without a lawful basis to remain in the United States, including at the order of immigration judges with the Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR). EOIR is a separate entity from DHS and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Immigration judges in these courts make decisions based on the merits of each individual case, determining if a noncitizen is subject to a final order of removal or eligible for certain forms of relief from removal.

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.