Turns out San Francisco took the murder from immigration who was in the process of deporting him for the sixth time, telling ICE they San Francisco first wanted to prosecute him for drug charges, ICE turned him over with the understanding that he could only be released back to ICE and not on the street after he does his time. San Francisco then dropped the charges and released him on the street ignoring the federal warrant for his deportation.
San Francisco took intentional acts of deception to keep the murder from being deported so they could release him back on the streets. They enabled this illegal thug to murder the woman and there should be accountability.
Federal immigration officials fired back Monday at San Francisco for putting back on the street an illegal immigrant -- with a lengthy criminal record, and deported five times -- now charged with the murder of a young woman at a popular city pier, saying "this terrible tragedy" could have been prevented if they had been notified of the suspect's release.
Francisco Sanchez, a Mexican national now under arrest on a homicide charge for last week's fatal shooting of Kathryn Steinle, 32, was in the custody of the San Francisco Sheriff's Department last March 26 on a decade-old drug charge, but was released on April 15 after local law enforcement officials declined to prosecute him.
In a detailed statement released Monday, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said that at the time it had turned over Sanchez to local law enforcement, it also had requested that they be kept apprised of any changes in his status -- and they weren't.
We're not asking local law enforcement to do our job," ICE spokeswoman Gillian Christensen said in the statement. "All we're asking is that they notify us when a serious foreign national criminal offender is being released to the street so we can arrange to take custody."
While saying the agency understands local law enforcement's "reticence" on the issue, Christensen said the bottom line is that if San Francisco authorities "had merely NOTIFIED ICE that they were about to release this individual into the community, ICE could have taken custody of him and had him removed from the country -- thus preventing this terrible tragedy."
The city did not notify ICE, she said, and, "As a result, an individual with a lengthy criminal history, who is now the suspect in a tragic murder case, was released onto the street rather than being turned over to ICE for deportation."
The circumstances surrounding Sanchez have reignited the debate over so-called sanctuary city policies.
As a sanctuary city, San Francisco like many other California cities does not turn over illegal immigrants to federal officials.
However, Sanchez has a lengthy rap sheet including violent crimes.
Freya Horne, an attorney for the San Francisco Sheriff's Department, told the Associated Press on Friday they had no authority to hold him. Horne said federal detention orders for not having documentation to be in the country is not considered a "legal basis" by San Francisco to hold someone, so Sanchez was released April 15. Horne said the city does not turn over people who are in the country illegally unless there's an active warrant for their arrest.
But a law enforcement official familiar with the issue said there are "literally no jurisdictions" in the country where ICE has to get a judicial warrant to request that local law enforcement notify them of a pending release. Once the city is notified of federal detention orders they are "mandated" by law to comply. The problem is that the DOJ has stopped taking action against those cities who do not comply with the federal detention orders when it comes to releasing illegal immigrants, even if they have a long list of criminal offenses, as in this case.
The official called this claim by San Francisco "ridiculous."
