U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) confirmed to Fox New’s Bill Melugin that the illegal immigrant who allegedly murdered Rachel Morin, a mother of five from Maryland, had entered the U.S. as a “gotaway.”
In a statement sent to Fox News, ICE confirmed Morin’s alleged killer was caught by Border Patrol three times within a matter of days in January and early February 2023 and was kicked back to Mexico under Title 42 each time.
ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations spokesperson James Covington said the suspect then successfully entered as a gotaway, meaning he enteredwithout being inspected, admitted or paroled by a U.S. immigration officer,”on or around February 13th, 2023″ near El Paso.
“On June 14, officers from the Tulsa, Oklahoma, police department and agents from the FBI arrested Victor Antonio Martinez-Hernandez, a 23-year-old unlawfully present Salvadoran national wanted by authorities in Harford County, Maryland, for the Aug. 6, 2023, murder of Rachel Morin,” Covington said.
RACHEL MORIN MURDER: ILLEGAL MIGRANT SUSPECT TO BE EXTRADITED TO MARYLAND THIS WEEK
Victor Martinez Hernandez, 23, was arrested in the murder of Rachel Morin. (Harford Co. Sheriff’s Office)
“U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement lodged an immigration detainer against Martinez-Hernandez with the Tulsa County Jail on June 15, 2024. On June 20, 2024, authorities in Tulsa, Oklahoma, successfully extradited Martinez-Hernandez to Harford County, Maryland. Martinez-Hernandez currently remains in the Harford County Jail pending trial,” he continued.
Martinez-Hernandez was arrested on June 14 after a 10-month investigation into Morin’s murder.
He was charged with first-degree murder and first-degree rape.
A photo of Rachel Morin is posted to a tree along the Ma & Pa Trail in Bel Air, Maryland, on Aug. 10, 2023. The 37-year-old was murdered while hiking the trail. (Mega for Fox News Digital)
“We all suspected that Rachel was not his first victim,” Harford County Sheriff Jeffery Gahler previously said during the arrest announcement. “It is my understanding that this suspect, this monster, fled to the United States illegally after committing the brutal murder of a young woman in El Salvador a month earlier in January of 2023.”
Morin, 37, was reported missing in August by her boyfriend, who said she never returned after going out for a run on the Ma & Pa Trail, a pedestrian trail, in Bel Air, a quiet and typically safe town about 28 miles northeast of Baltimore, on Aug. 5, 2023.
At the announcement of Martinez Hernandez’s arrest, Gahler slammed the Biden administration’s “failed immigration policies.”
RACHEL MORIN MURDER: OPEN BORDER ‘ALLOWED’ ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT TO KILL MOM OF 5, MARYLAND SHERIFF SAYS
Illegal immigrant Victor Antonio Martinez-Hernandez, left, Sheriff Jeffrey Gahler of Harford County, top right, Rachel Morin, bottom right. (Tulsa Police Department | Fox News | Facebook)
“We are 1,800 miles from the southern border,” Gahler said. “And American citizens are not safe because of their failed immigration policies.”
“This is the second time in two years that an innocent Harford County woman has lost her life to a criminal in our country illegally,” he said, repeating his statement. “In both cases, they are suspects from El Salvador with ties to criminal gangs. This should not be happening.”
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Martinez Hernandez remains in the Harford County Jail pending trial.
Fox News Digital’s Sarah Rumpf-Whitten and Baille Hill contributed to this report.
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