A Maryland sheriff has opened the US southern border after an illegal immigrant — already wanted for the murder of a woman in his native El Salvador — was arrested Friday and charged with the rape and murder of Rachel Morin, a mother of five who was killed while hiking last year.
Harford County Sheriff Jeffrey Gahler said illegal immigrant Victor Antonio Martinez Hernandez, 23, should never have come to the country to commit this horrific crime.
Investigators said he was arrested Friday night “sitting idle” at a bar in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Police information and DNA evidence helped them solve the case and capture him.
“He killed a woman in El Salvador, and that’s why he fled there and came here through our open border,” Gahler told America’s Newsroom on Monday.
Illegal immigrant Victor Antonio Martinez Hernandez, left; Harford County Sheriff Jeffrey Gehler, top right; Rachel Morin with her boyfriend Richard Tobin, bottom right. (Tulsa Police Department, Fox News, Facebook)
“He tried to come in legally but he was sent back. And of course, that didn’t stop him because we have a very open border and he got in without any hassle … and this is the result.”
The nude and mutilated body of Morin, 37, was found in a creek on Aug. 6, a day after he went missing while hiking on the Ma and Pa Trail in Bel Air, a quiet and generally safe town about 28 miles away. northeast of Baltimore,
Gahler said Martínez Hernández is free to move anywhere in the U.S. since he entered the country illegally in February 2023, about a month after he was declared wanted in El Salvador. For murder. Police linked Martinez Hernandez’s DNA to a March home invasion in Los Angeles, where a mother and her 9-year-old daughter were attacked.
“For my citizens in Harford County, for every citizen in this country, this is a public safety crisis and we can easily fix it by creating a workable immigration policy for our country. It’s crazy that we would allow events like Rachel’s murder to happen, and when I say ‘let it happen,’ we mean we allowed it to happen by letting her come into this country unchallenged.”
“This shouldn’t happen to families in our country. It’s preventable.”
Rachel Morin murder: Former FBI agent reveals how illegal immigrant suspect in murder was caught
The Harford County Sheriff’s Office in Maryland posted signs at the Ma and Pa trail heads on June 17, 2024, announcing an arrest in the August 2023 murder of Rachel Morin. (Harford County Sheriff’s Office/Facebook)
Gehler said Maryland does not have the death penalty, but he hopes Martinez Hernandez rots in prison for his alleged crimes. The sheriff added that a bipartisan effort is needed to solve border issues that have been going on for decades.
“The border has never been more secure than when President Trump was in office, but this is an issue that spans my 40 years.” Law enforcement.”
Meanwhile, Trump commented on Morin’s death on Monday, comparing it to the death of Georgia student Laken Riley and placing blame on President Biden.
“Rachel Morin was on the run in Maryland just like Laken Riley was on the run in Georgia after he was brutally killed by an illegal monster who was wanted for murder in El Salvador and fled to the USA because he knew Crooked Joe would let him in,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Now Rachel Morin’s 5 little children will grow up without their mother because Crooked Joe refuses to close the border.”
Video: Lawyer Randolph Rice reacts to arrest of illegal immigrant in Rachel Morin case
Randolph Rice, an attorney for Morin’s family, said it was amazing that a man like Martinez Hernandez, who was already wanted in his country for murder, was able to enter the United States.
“This is an American problem, and you would think that Border Patrol would be able to stop people and say, ‘Are you wanted for murder in your country? If so, you can’t come here,'” Rice told Fox & Friends First on Monday.
“And so this is definitely a huge problem and Maryland is very far from the southern border, so clearly this is not just something that affects the southern states. It’s reaching Maryland and Harford County, which is a very rural, small county. This can happen anywhere in the US and it’s something that is very, very serious.” Washington really needs to fix this.”
Maryland sheriff’s ‘gut’ says suspect ‘stalked’ him before Rachel Morin’s murder
Victor Martínez Hernández, 23, (right) was arrested for the murder of Rachel Morin (left).
Rice told Fox News on Monday that Martinez Hernandez has waived extradition and will soon be sent back to Maryland.
On May 20, which would have been Maureen’s 38th birthday, a DNA tip yielded clues that ultimately resulted in the arrest of Martínez Hernández.
“Finding the DNA in Los Angeles was a huge breakthrough in the investigation,” Gahler said. “So working together across a planet of billions of people we were able to find a man, identify him and locate him sitting on a bar stool in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and take him into custody.”
Surveillance footage of the suspect leaving his home Los Angeles home A photo was released publicly in February, showing a shirtless man running from the home. The suspect reportedly broke into the home in the middle of the night and attacked the family inside, after which he was escorted out, but he left a hat at the scene.
Gahler said multiple agencies assisted in the intensive investigation, including the FBI and law enforcement officials from Los Angeles and Tulsa.
Rachel Morin murder: Maryland police link crime scene DNA to Los Angeles attack and home invasion
A photo of Rachel Morin was placed by her family on a tree along the Ma and Pa Trail in Bel Air, Maryland last night, August 10, 2023. (MEGA for Fox News Digital)
Bill Delbango, FBI Baltimore Field OfficeIn a press conference on Saturday, he said that FBI investigators also traveled to El Salvador as part of an effort to identify Morin’s alleged killer.
“Our investigative genetic genealogy team in Baltimore worked countless hours to identify the suspect using crime scene DNA and to trace that DNA to potential family members,” Delbango said.
“In order to find the suspect, we provided technical assistance in determining his location. This brings us to (Friday night), where Tulsa police and FBI agents were able to successfully capture and arrest the suspect in Oklahoma.”
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Police on the Williams Street section of the Ma and Pa Trail in Bel Air, Maryland on August 8, 2023. (MEGA for Fox News Digital)
Maureen’s mother, Patricia, praised the efforts of law enforcement at the press conference.
“At one point when things looked very hopeless and hopeless, the lead detective said to me, ‘Patience will prevail in the end.’ And that’s what (investigators) are doing,” he said.
“They’ve been working very hard, and they’ve been patiently working all the leads. And that’s what led us to an arrest today, so I’m very grateful to these guys.”
