A second illegal migrant has been taken into custody in connection with the weekend shooting of an off-duty Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officer during an attempted robbery in New York City, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced Monday.
Noem, who visited the injured officer in the hospital, criticized sanctuary city policies, suggesting they contributed to the attack. The officer was reportedly shot in the face and forearm Saturday night in Manhattan’s Riverside Park. One suspect, Miguel Francisco Mora Nunez, a Dominican national previously apprehended by Border Patrol in April 2023, was already in custody following the incident.
“There’s absolutely zero reason that someone who is scum of the earth like this should be running loose on the streets of New York City,” Noem told reporters Monday in reference to Nunez. “He was arrested four different times in New York City, and because of the mayor’s policies and sanctuary city policies, was released back to do harm to people and to individuals living in this city.”
“We were able to bring the second individual in and have detained him as well, and he will face consequences and hopefully strong prosecution for his crimes and his involvement on Saturday night,” she added. Noem identified that suspect as Christhian Aybar-Berroa, an illegal immigrant from the Dominican Republic who “entered the country illegally in 2022 under the Biden Administration and was ordered for final removal in 2023 by an immigration judge.”
Noem stated that Aybar-Berroa has a criminal record in New York City, and that detainers were disregarded due to Mayor Eric Adams’ sanctuary city policies. “He was arrested for reckless endangerment and larceny and was released before ICE could get him off the streets,” Noem mentioned in a post on X.
Multiple sources within U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement told Fox News that the suspects involved in the shooting and attempted robbery of the off-duty CBP officer are believed to be the same individuals captured on video during an armed robbery at a business in Leominster, Massachusetts, back in February.
In that incident, sources said the suspects bound the store owner with duct tape, held them at gunpoint, and stole two firearms.
Christhian Aybar-Berroa, left, and Miguel Francisco Mora Nunez, right, have been taken into custody following the shooting of an off-duty CBP officer in New York City on Saturday, July 19. (Department of Homeland Security)
After visiting the officer on Monday, Noem said, “I just want you all to know that we have our hearts and our prayers going out with our officer and with his family and his friends, and will be lifting him up in prayer for his quick recovery and his healing from this terrible tragedy that has befallen him.”
“I’m calling on every single mayor and sanctuary city and sanctuary governor to change their policies and to change their tactics right now,” she continued. “Their job is to take an oath to protect the public, to protect families that are out there every single day trying to provide for each other and to try to live the American dream.
“We can look across this country at other mayors. We look at Mayor Wu in Boston and what has happened there under her watch, what’s happened in LA with the riots and the violence and the protests that have gone on because of Mayor Bass and what she has perpetuated. When you look at Mayor Johnson in Chicago and how devastating it is to live in that city in some of those poorest communities, how they suffer every single day with the violence that’s in front of them,” Noem said.
