Immigration agents nabbed 206 illegal migrants in and around New York City during a massive operation last week that took wanton criminals and gangbangers off the streets, The Post has learned.
Among those collared by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and other feds were 121 illegal migrants with criminal convictions or charges including murder, assault, arson and sex crimes against children, as well as a laundry list of drug and gun offenses.
One suspect, Edimar Alejandra Colmenares Mendoza is a member of the violent Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, the feds say. She was picked up at a Bronx building that the NYPD previously raided for gang members in January.
Her neighbors had nothing good to say about the 22-year-old, with one telling The Post “good riddance.”
“I’m just happy to be rid of her,” Cataline Gonzalez, 42, said.
“This building might not be much to look at, but there are good families living here with children who go to school every day and play in the hallways. We don’t need people coming from the outside and want to play by their own rules.”
Some of the others were previously released from custody due to local jurisdictions refusing to honor immigration detainers and opting instead to turn them loose in their communities, ICE said. One of the suspects was previously convicted of murder in the Philippines.
The NYPD is severely restricted in how much it can cooperate with federal immigration authorities, thanks to the city’s permissive “sanctuary city” laws, which specify that cops can only work with ICE when a criminal detainer has been ordered by a judge.
In addition to the Tren de Aragua gang-banger, gang members from MS-13, Sureños and the 18th Street crews were among the violent offenders swept up in the “enhanced enforcement operation” undertaken by federal authorities, according to ICE .
“Throughout this enhanced enforcement operation, we targeted the most dangerous alien offenders in some of the most crime-infested neighborhoods in and around the city of New York,” said acting ICE director Todd Lyons.
Some of the worst offenders arrested in Tuesday’s sweeping raids included:
- Colmenares Mendoza, who was previously charged with conspiracy, larceny and possession of stolen property.
- Camilo Cesar Gonzales-Encalada, 23, an illegal immigrant from Spain and member of the Sureños gang April 6. His extensive criminal history includes convictions for assault, criminal possession of a loaded weapon and criminal possession of a controlled substance.
- Alexander Steven Jimbo-Perez, 25, an Ecuadorian illegal migrant who was previously arrested for assault with intent to cause physical injury, act in a manner to injure a child less than 17, criminal possession stolen property and harassment physical contact.
- Marcos Tul-Guallpa, 39, an Guatemalan illegal migrant, was also scooped up following his arrest for sexual abuse of child below the age of 17.
- Derrick Alphonso Roberts, 60, a Jamaican national whose rap sheet includes convictions for manslaughter, drug possession, terroristic threats, corruption of minors and many other offenses, was arrested on April 7.
- Luis Olmedo Quishpi-Poalasin, 35, an illegal immigrant from Ecuador with a long list of criminal convictions for just about every sex crime in the book including rape and sexual contact with a person incapable of consent, as well as witness tampering, aggravated harassment and many more.
Neighbors at 3724 Dekalb Ave. in the Bronx, where Colmenares Mendoza was busted, said they believed the Tren de Aragua member lived on the second floor of the six-story brick building in Woodlawn with another young woman and several young men.
And they remember the NYPD previously busting Tren de Aragua members in the building on gun charges during a major raid in January.
“If that’s the girl I’m thinking of, she was this tiny girl, almost looked like a kid, and there was another girl about the same size, and they were together all the time. They didn’t make any trouble that I saw. Occasionally I’d see them smoke, but that was about it,” a female resident told the Post.
Other residents also said they were relieved to see the criminal element expunged from the building.
“I’m glad they caught her and are sending her back to where she came from. It’s very scary that a person like this should be living in an apartment so close to my mother, who’s in her 80s and helpless,” Oscar Agosto, 59, who comes to visit his elderly mother at the building regularly, said.
“People like [Colmenares Mendoza] have no moral compass. If she needed money and knew there was an elderly person living here, she’d have no problem just breaking in and stealing from her.”
The multi-agency raids, led by ICE , mainly took place in NYC, but also stretched to Long Island and the Lower Hudson Valley region.
“The success of this enhanced operation highlights the resolve of ICE and our federal partners in keeping our country safe from violent criminal aliens,” said ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations New York City Acting Field Office Director Judith Almodovar.
“The majority of the aliens arrested have egregious criminal histories to include manslaughter, rape, assault, drug trafficking and sex assault against minors.”
The arrests follow recent similar operations in the Big Apple in which more than 150 additional criminal migrants were swept up by federal authorities.
Last month, ICE busted 133 people including three convicted killers, a 49-year-old from Trinidad and Tobago, a 32-year-old from El Salvador and a 70-year-old from the Dominican Republic.
In January, federal agents arrested about 30 illegals in a series of raids joined by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem — including a suspected Tren de Aragua leader.