The Best and Brightest

DEL RIO, TX (The Dallas Morning News) – A man convicted in the 2011 death of a motorcyclist in Dallas was arrested Saturday trying to illegally re-enter the country, officials said.

Border Patrol agents followed footprints through a ranch south of Brackettville, near the Texas-Mexico border, and apprehended Alejandro Pardo-Castro, a Mexican national, U.S. Customs and Border Protection said.

Pardo-Castro, 34, was convicted of criminally negligent homicide in February 2012 in the death of Waxahachie resident Modena Dollison.

Dollison, 43, was riding her motorcycle on State Highway 161 near Interstate 20 when a pickup turned left in front of her and hit her. She was pronounced dead at a hospital.

Police at the time said Pardo-Castro had no driver’s license and was in the U.S. illegally.

He was sentenced to 18 months in prison and deported to Mexico in 2013, Border Protection officials said.

“I thank our agents for their hard work and vigilance, which prevents these types of criminals from re-entering our communities,” Del Rio Sector Chief Patrol Agent Felix Chavez said in a written statement.

Pardo-Castro faces a charge of illegal re-entry after deportation, punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

He will remain in the U.S. until the case is adjudicated and any sentenced prison term is served, then will be deported again, Border Protection spokesman Dennis Smith said.

RACINE COUNTY, WI (Fox News) – An illegal immigrant on a Greyhound bus who allegedly threatened to shoot and kill passengers on Friday — leading police on a chase from Wisconsin to Illinois — was deported five times, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesperson told Fox News.

The spokesperson said on Sunday that Margarito Vargas-Rosas, 33, who faces terror charges, was in the U.S. illegally and was “removed” from the U.S. the last five times Border Patrol agents encountered him. He also had a previous DUI arrest to his name.

A judge in Illinois on Sunday ordered the suspect held without bond. Vargas-Rosas faces a fugitive-from-justice charge.

Police responded to a call around 9:40 p.m. Friday from a bus passenger who claimed there was a person threatening to kill people, Fox 6 reported, citing the Racine County Sheriff’s Department.

Vargas-Rosas, of Chicago, was reportedly pacing the aisle toward the back of the bus, and appeared to draw what passengers thought was a weapon from his waistband.

Deputies with the Milwaukee and Kenosha County Sheriff’s Offices both attempted to pull the bus over, but the driver didn’t stop the vehicle.

…

Authorities ultimately used spike strips to flatten the vehicle’s tires, which forced it to a stop on Interstate 94 near the Illinois community of Wadsworth.

While the bus eventually stopped, the driver, according to Dodd, “didn’t stop after the first spike strip, he went on to Illinois” before hitting the second spike strip.

Another passenger, Terrance Williams of New Jersey, said he thought police were escorting the bus, not realizing what was happening in the back. He was also confused about why the bus driver took so long to pull over.

“The law is, you see emergency lights, you pull over,” Williams said. “(The police) were in front of us, they were in back of us.”

“I think he ultimately recognized that this was a serious event when we spiked his tires,” Schmaling said of the driver.

Vargas-Rosas was ordered off the bus at gunpoint, according to Fox 6, and was taken into custody without incident. Schmaling said the man made threats to law enforcement as he was being transported to jail.

Officials didn’t locate a weapon on Vargas-Rosas, but said the bus will be thoroughly searched.

None of the nearly 40 people aboard the bus were injured.

Vargas-Rosas is in the U.S. illegally, and was previously deported to Mexico in 2012.

Vargas-Rosas reportedly faces charges of felony terroristic threats and disorderly conduct.

BURLINGTON, VT (The VT Digger) – A man who allegedly used a machete to attack a 73-year-old Meals on Wheels volunteer pleaded not guilty to an attempted murder charge.

Appearing in Chittenden Superior Court via video Monday, Abukar Ibrahim, 32, watched as his attorney entered not guilty pleas on Ibrahim’s behalf to charges of attempted first-degree murder, two counts of unlawful mischief and violating conditions of release.

Judge David Fenster ordered Ibrahim to undergo a sanity and competency evaluation and to be held without bail at the Northwest State Correctional Facility. Ibrahim will next appear in court in early February. The court also granted him an interpreter who speaks Maay Maay, a language used mostly in Somalia; however, no interpreter was evident in the courtroom Monday.

Shelburne police responded Friday to calls of a man breaking car windows at the Harbor Place motel. Police said they found the Meals on Wheels volunteer with severe leg wounds and Ibrahim barricaded in a room, taunting police. It took officers more than two hours to get Ibrahim to come out, according to authorities.

The volunteer was treated at the University of Vermont Medical Center and released.

Ibrahim’s attorney, Bryan Dodge, declined to answer questions from reporters at Monday’s arraignment and said he does not know when he will comment on the case. Two men who said they knew Ibrahim also showed up at the courthouse looking for Dodge, but they declined to answer questions.

Ibrahim started staying at Harbor Place only recently, said Chris Donnelly, a spokesman for the Champlain Housing Trust, which owns and runs the property. The trust bought the motel in 2013 and uses it for emergency housing.

“It’s a place that people are at to either escape a violent situation at home, or are out on the streets,” Donnelly said.

James Scott said he has been living at Harbor Place since December. Scott was leaving the motel office Friday and came across the victim, who had blood running down her leg and tracking on the floor, he said.

“I just happened to be coming out of the office and helped her in. She looked fine but scared, wicked scared,” Scott said.

Scott said the attack made him feel unsafe, and he raised questions about who is allowed to live in the motel.

“I sort of do feel unsafe. They let just about anyone in here without putting a background check on them,” he said.

Donnelly said the trust has turned away people who are on the sex offender registry and people who staff or police believe might be a danger to others. But as a practice residents aren’t subject to background checks, he said.

“These are people who are receiving a public benefit, and so there really has to be a cause to deny them that public benefit, otherwise it’s discriminatory,” he said. “Where do you draw the line for what pops up on the background check?”

Many people are referred to Harbor Place through state agencies like the Department for Children and Families, Donnelly said. There has been a recent influx due to the cold snap that brought several days of below-zero weather.

“It’s hard to have any 100 percent foolproof system in place,” he said. “This is just an awful, awful thing that happened.”

NEW ULM, MN (The Journal) – Bail for a 44-year-old Sleepy Eye man accused of causing the death of an 11-week-old infant at Children’s Hospital, Minneapolis, Jan. 7, was set at $1 million without conditions and $500,000 with conditions in Brown County District Court Jan. 9.

Jose Isabel Rodriguez Limones, 318 Maple St. S.W., said to be an illegal Mexican immigrant who has been deported at least once, faces charges of second-degree murder, first and second-degree manslaughter, and first and fifth-degree assault.

The cause of death was preliminarily reported to be respiratory failure, secondary to severe traumatic brain injury, according to court documents. An autopsy will be performed, according to the Brown County Attorney’s Office.

Sleepy Eye Police talked with a Children’s Hospital social worker on Jan. 8. The worker confirmed that on Jan. 6, the victim was removed from a ventilator. The victim stopped breathing at about 12:45 a.m. Jan. 7.

Police got a fax Jan. 2 from a mandated reporter and doctor at the hospital, informing them of a possible child abuse case involving an 11-week-old child born to Christian Hinojosa and Jose Isabel Rodriguez Limones. The fax stated that the baby boy was brought to the hospital earlier that morning with seizures and was found to have extensive subdural hemorrhage and brain injury.

In addition, the fax read that there was no history of trauma to explain the findings that were highly concerning for inflicted injury and child physical abuse, specifically for abusive head trauma.

Police and Brown County Attorney Chuck Hanson determined it would be appropriate to place the victim on a 72-hour police health and welfare hold.

Police were later contacted by a Children’s Hospital social worker who talked with police, the victim’s parents and an interpreter on speaker phone. Hinojosa and Rodriguez Limones said they are the primary care givers, did not abuse the victim and nothing happened.

In an interview, the victim’s parents said they noticed the victim was not behaving normally on Dec. 25. The boy was reportedly crying more and waking up more, spat up his formula, seemed out of it and was unresponsive. At a Dec. 28 routine well-child check, the couple expressed some concerns but said that their primary care doctor reassured them all of the boy’s behavior was normal.

On the night prior to admission to Children’s Hospital, Hinojosa went to work and Rodriguez Limones was alone with the victim. He reported the victim was trembling at the time but took a bottle well, was burped and put to bed twice, then woke up and seemed very jerky. Rodriguez Limones said he took the victim to Sleepy Eye Medical Center where he was evaluated and transferred to Children’s Hospital.

An examiner noted the victim was evaluated at the Midwest Children’s Resource Center (MCRC) for possible physical abuse because of mental status changes and seizures and was found on head CT to have extensive intracranial bleeding and brain injury. The finding of subdural bleeding and brain injury are highly associated with abusive head trauma.

In addition, the examiner noted that the extent of the victim’s brain injury suggests there was at least one event that would be described as “terminal” and that would render him neurologically devastated. The examiner noted that it is likely one event occurred immediately before the victim became acutely gravely ill on Jan. 2, and possibly ongoing events occurred over the prior several days to weeks. The finding is supported by the description of him having become irritable and having a change of temperament over the weeks since Dec. 25.

The examiner concluded that some event occurred on Jan. 2 that was catastrophic.

According to statements from Hinojosa and Rodriguez Limones, the only person who was with the victim prior to, and at the time of the traumatic event, was Rodriguez Limones.

Rodriguez Limones was ordered to have no direct or indirect contact with Hinojosa. If Rodriguez Limones bails out of jail, he must pay a two-week GPS monitoring fee before he would be released.

Brown County Attorney Hanson said he considers Rodriguez Limones a significant public safety risk without significant local ties.

“He’s undocumented, in the country illegally, having been deported at least once,” Hanson said. Rodriguez Limones’ next court appearance is 8:30 a.m. Jan. 23.

NOGALES, AZ (AZCENTRAL) – Border Patrol agents in southern Arizona arrested a Guatemalan man previously convicted of murder, after he crossed the U.S.-Mexico border in a rural area west of Nogales.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection said agents were on patrol on Thursday afternoon near the community of Arivaca when they came across Walter Ramirez-Perez.

After determining he was in the country illegally, they ran his fingerprints in database records, the CBP said. Agents discovered that in 2005, Ramirez-Perez was convicted of criminal negligent homicide in Houston.

The 37-year-old migrant spent four years in jail and was then deported back to Guatemala, according to the CBP.

Ramirez-Perez will remain in federal custody and faces charges of illegal re-entry.

MINNEAPOLIS, MN (LeoHohmann.com) -The tragic story of what happened to Morgan Evenson two weeks before Christmas is starting to gain traction in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Ignored by the city’s largest newspaper, the Star Tribune, a second local TV station picked up the story Tuesday about the brutal attack by a Somali migrant that left the 26-year-old woman in a hospital bed with 14 stab wounds and a lacerated kidney.

It’s been nearly three weeks since a man described as a Somali immigrant attacked Evenson while she was walking home from work in uptown Minneapolis, slashing and stabbing her relentlessly while trying to drag her off of a public street.

She did not know the man and has no idea why he attacked her.

Police still haven’t made any arrests in the case but say they are working multiple leads.

The fact that a Somali migrant targeted a young white woman while walking alone, and that he remains on the loose, has women watching their backs.

Several women told Fox 9 KMSP they are afraid to walk alone on the streets of this popular shopping district that they previously thought was safe.

And now the victim herself is speaking out, revealing new information about her attacker that cast doubt upon the official police narrative about what happened that night.

Minneapolis police said after the Dec. 13 attack that they considered it an attempted robbery.

Crime Prevention Specialist Jennifer Neale told the Southwest Journal on Dec. 20: “We’re still scratching our heads about it, because it’s just so brazen,” noting the level of violence used to “get a purse.”

There’s only one problem with that statement.

Evenson says the man made no attempt to snatch her purse.

She fought back with all she had as he continuously thrust his knife into her torso, wrists, arms and shoulders. She resisted long enough for a male pedestrian to hear her screams and come running to her aid, sending the Somali attacker fleeing.

After being released from the hospital Evenson immediately moved out of state and said she fears for the safety of her friends still living in uptown Minneapolis, where she worked at the Apple Store in a shopping district that includes Victoria’s Secret, high-end jewelry stores and coffee shops.

She said she got a clear look at her attacker, whom she described as a black man in his early 20s, thin build, low-cut afro and a slight Somali accent.

He sneaked up from behind and tackled her to the ground, then started stabbing.

“I would say it was two to three minutes of struggling with him as he was dragging me through the snow,” Evenson told Fox 9. “This person who did this to me is still out there. I don’t know if he intends to do this to someone else, or if this was a one-time thing. Was it because I was a woman? Was it the color of my skin? Was it the purse on my shoulder even though you didn’t take anything from me?”

She said she lives for the day when she could identify her attacker for the police.

“I don’t want this to change who I am because I don’t want to be a scared person but it would be so, so amazing to have this person turned in and to look at him in the face and to hopefully convict him of something.”

Despite Evenson’s clear description of the man, police have still not released a composite sketch of the suspect, which would seem to be a normal course of action in a case like this.

But the Minneapolis Police Department is no stranger to controversy when it comes to cases that involve Somali refugees. The city is home to the nation’s largest Somali-American population, more than 50,000 strong, almost all of them hand-selected for resettlement in the U.S. by the United Nations.

In August the fifth precinct’s first Somali police officer, Mohamed Noor, shot and killed an unarmed white woman, Justine Damond, but the department has yet to file any charges against the officer.

In the summer of 2016 a band of more than a dozen Somali men terrorized the city’s Linden Hills community for three straight days, threatening to rape a woman, beating one resident’s dog, and shouting “jihad!” as they drove vehicles over residents’ lawns and pretended to shoot people through their duffel bags. No arrests were made.

And then there was the mysterious 2014 apartment explosion in a Somali neighborhood of Minneapolis in which three people lost their lives. No arrests were ever made in that case either, nor any explanation for the cause of the explosion.

None of this sloppy police activity surprises former FBI counter-terrorism specialist John Guandolo. He says the sheriff of Hennepin County is easily manipulated by Muslim activist groups such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the local Somali imams.

“Minneapolis police and the sheriff’s office there are so in bed with the jihadis they don’t know which way is up,” Gondolo said.

That’s an accusation some might find alarming and even too sensational to believe. Yet, the best evidence may be the words coming directly from the mouth of Hennepin County Sheriff Rich Stanek three years ago at the White House Summit on Countering Violent Extremism, comments that were captured on video by C-SPAN.

Stanek told the White House Summit in February 2015 that he basically gets all his information about what’s going on in Minneapolis’s Somali neighborhoods from a local Somali imam he affectionately referred to as “Imam Roble.”