BEAUMONT, Texas –A 49-year-old Mexican national with multiple prior felony convictions has been sentenced to federal prison for immigration violations in the Eastern District of Texas, announced U.S. Attorney Joseph D. Brown Wednesday, July 17.

Luis Garcia-Torres pleaded guilty on April 15, 2019, to unlawful reentry by a deported alien and was sentenced to 41 months in federal prison today by U.S. District Judge Thad Heartfield.

According to information presented in court, on Jan. 13, 2019, Garcia-Torres was arrested in Orange County, Texas for driving while intoxicated.  After being booked into the Orange County Jail, it was discovered that Garcia-Torres illegal alien with prior felony convictions.  A records check revealed Garcia-Torres had been convicted of voluntary manslaughter in 1988 in North Carolina, aggravated battery with a dangerous weapon in Louisiana in 2001, and aggravated re-entry of a removed alien in 2015.  Garcia-Torres had also been previously deported from the United States to Mexico in 1990, 2011, and 2016.  Garcia-Torres was indicted by a federal grand jury in the Eastern District of Texas on Feb. 16, 2019, and charged with immigration violations.

This case was investigated by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) and the Texas Department of Public Safety and prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Randall L. Fluke.