A man accused of sexually abusing a teen girl in Virginia is an illegal immigrant from Venezuela who was “paroled” into the U.S. last year under Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’s relaxed border policies.
Renzo Josue Mendoza Montes, 31, is the latest in a string of high-profile crimes blamed on illegal immigrants who have taken advantage of parole or other catch-and-release policies under the Biden administration.
Mr. Mendoza was arrested in Campbell County late last week on charges of carnal knowledge of a child 13 or 14 years of age, without force.
“An immigration detainer has been lodged against Mendoza with the Blue Ridge Regional Jail Authority,” said James Covington, a spokesperson for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the government’s deportation agency.
Officials said Mr. Mendoza was first detected trying to enter the U.S. in early May, but the Title 42 pandemic expulsion policy was in effect and he was quickly pushed back into Mexico.
On Sept. 2 he tried again, showing up at an official border crossing — an invitation Mr. Mayorkas has made to Venezuelans and citizens of select other countries, telling them they can be paroled if they agree not to jump the border.
Mr. Mendoza was given an immigration court summons and then paroled, with a court appearance scheduled for a year from now — or nearly 18 months after he entered.
His new criminal arrest follows that of a Venezuelan man, also caught and released under Mr. Biden, who stands accused of killing a nursing student in Georgia, and two Venezuelan men who have been linked with a transnational gang and been charged in the mob attack on two New York City police officers.
ICE this week also confirmed a man accused of murdering a toddler in Maryland is in the country illegally.
Nilson Noel Trejo-Granados had been ordered deported by an immigration judge in 2022 but was still loose in the U.S., despite two previous arrests by Montgomery County, Maryland. In each of those cases the county defied a detainer request from ICE.
ICE also confirmed that the man accused of shooting and wounding three police officers in Washington, D.C., this month is an illegal immigrant, as is the man accused of stealing a Maryland state tow truck and plowing into more than a dozen vehicles while leading police on a wild chase.