District attorney seeks death penalty in case highlighted in US election
The killing of 12-year-old Jocelyn Nungaray has been cited by Donald Trump as a demonstration of the risks associated with undocumented immigration.
Donald Trump speaks alongside Alexis Nungaray during a news conference in Austin, Texas, on October 25 [AP Photo]
In the announcement made on Friday, District Attorney Ogg reiterated some of the criticisms regarding immigration enforcement that were voiced by Trump during his campaign.
“Jocelyn’s murder was as heinous, brutal, and senseless as any case I have encountered during my time as district attorney,” Ogg stated.
“It is even more tragic knowing that these two individuals were in the country illegally, and had they been detained after their apprehension at the border, they would not have had the chance to take Jocelyn’s life and devastate her family’s future.”
In June, prosecutors brought capital murder charges against the two suspects, who are currently being held in jail with bonds set at $10 million.
Nevertheless, numerous studies have indicated that immigrants, as a group, are less likely to engage in criminal activity compared to citizens born in the United States.
He leveraged these fears to criticize his opponents within the Democratic Party, charging President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris with permitting “open borders.”
While irregular migration across the US-Mexico border did reach unprecedented levels during Biden’s administration, it has since decreased to figures comparable to those observed during Trump’s initial term from 2017 to 2021.
For instance, the number of monthly border patrol “encounters” in October fell to 106,344. A press release from US Customs and Border Protection that month indicated that the number of apprehensions was “the lowest it has been” since the 2020 fiscal year.
Additionally, Biden has enacted stringent policies to restrict asylum at the border, mirroring some of the measures implemented by Trump. One such policy, introduced in June, permitted the suspension of asylum applications if irregular border crossings exceeded 2,500 individuals per day.
Other measures included penalties such as a five-year reentry ban and the potential for criminal prosecution.