Although Los Angeles, New York and Chicago are at the epicenter of the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement measures, Oklahoma, too, is on the front line of efforts to stem the influx of undocumented immigrants.
The driving distance between Oklahoma City and Brownsville, Texas, at the Rio Grande River dividing the United States and Mexico, is nearly 750 miles. Nevertheless, more than 60 Hispanics and a native of India have been arrested in the Sooner State during the last five months and prosecuted in federal courts in Oklahoma City, Tulsa and Muskogee.
Two-thirds of the defendants were charged with unauthorized entry or illegal reentry into the United States, and 19 have been accused of various other offenses.
• Jose Reyes Zamora-de la Torre, 33, a Mexican national, pleaded guilty April 4, 2025, to illegally entering the U.S. after previously being expelled on May 31, 2024.
Zamora-de la Torre came to the attention of U.S. immigration officials on Jan. 16 after his arrest in Oklahoma City for assault and battery on a police officer, public drunkenness, and obstruction of a law enforcement officer, plus malicious injury to property.
He pleaded guilty Feb. 25 to the state offenses and has been in federal custody since Feb. 27.
Zamora-de la Torre was sentenced July 22 to 14 months in federal prison for unauthorized reentry to the U.S. and will be deported again upon completion of his sentence.
“After serving his time, he wants to spend the rest of his life in Mexico, avoiding any additional criminal activity” and working there “to provide a life” for himself and his aging mother, who lives in Mexico, his attorney wrote.
After his expulsion, Zamora-de la Torre has no desire to return to the United States “because he wants to be with his family in Mexico rather than imprisoned in El Salvador, Rwanda or Libya” under agreements with the Trump administration, the attorney informed the court.
• Jose Luis Moreno (aka Moreno-Yanez), 39 – a violent offender with a criminal record dating back 16 years – was sentenced July 11 in Tulsa’s federal court to six and a half years in prison for unlawful reentry of a removed alien. The Mexican national was indicted for being in the U.S. illegally on May 31, 2023, after having been previously expelled.
Judge Gregory K. Frizzell ordered that 39 months of the federal sentence be served consecutively to (i.e., after) Moreno’s state sentences for other crimes – offenses for which he must serve at least 85% of the sentence.
“By the time he completes the state sentences,” Moreno will be 56 years old “and subject to deportation” – again – his attorney noted in a sentencing memorandum.
Moreno was previously deported in December 2021, but at some point he slipped back into the U.S.
He robbed an individual in Tulsa on May 29, 2023. Two days later he was pulled over by Tulsa police for failure to stop at a red light, having no valid driver’s license, and transporting a firearm after a prior felony conviction. In addition, while in jail he was found to be in possession of drugs. Later that day charges were filed against him in Tulsa County District Court.
A month and a half later he was charged in Tulsa County with having committed three felony crimes on May 31, 2023: armed robbery of one individual, firing his gun into the ground, and shooting another person. Moreno pleaded guilty to all of the allegations and was sentenced to 18 years in state prison for the May 29 robbery, and 20 years for the May 31 robbery and shooting. The sentences are slated to run concurrently (simultaneously).
Moreno previously pleaded guilty in Tulsa County in October 2009 to false impersonation of someone else “to create liability,” plus resisting arrest; he was sentenced to one year in state prison, with four years suspended. Less than a year later the suspension was revoked, apparently for failure to pay $1,692 in fines and fees.
Subsequently Moreno was convicted in Woodward County District Court of possessing a cellphone in 2011 while in the William S. Key Correctional Center at Fort Supply, serving the Tulsa County revocation.
• Sai Kumar Kurremula, 31, an Indian national who was living in Edmond on an immigrant visa, pleaded guilty to sexual exploitation of three minor victims – although public documents and evidence presented in court alleged Kurremula sexually exploited at least 19 minors via Snapchat, “often posing as a 13- to 15-year-old boy to gain the trust of his victims.” He also admitted “knowingly transporting” images of child pornography.
Kurremula was sentenced in Oklahoma City’s federal court to 35 years in federal prison, followed by a lifetime term of supervised release.
• Gustavo Gordillo, 42, of Guatemala – who entered the U.S. on a temporary visa that later expired – pleaded guilty June 12 to sexual exploitation of children. He admitted producing child sexual abuse material “for transportation in interstate or foreign commerce.” Eight mobile telephone were seized from him when he was arrested.
At sentencing in Oklahoma City’s federal court, Gordillo faces a minimum of 15 years and a maximum of 30 years in federal prison.
• Luis Banegas Rodriguez, 25, of Honduras, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bank fraud in Oklahoma and Indiana.
In January 2023 Rodriguez and some co-conspirators used fake identification cards to cash 169 fraudulent paychecks totaling $233,569 at three branches of the same bank in Indiana. The fake checks were designed to appear that they had been issued by a company that operates dairy farms in Indiana.
Almost six months later, Rodriguez and his cohorts used bogus ID cards to cash 178 fraudulent paychecks totaling $299,474 at five branches of the same bank and three check cashing businesses in Oklahoma. The fraudulent paychecks were designed to look like they were issued by a building materials supply company in eastern Oklahoma, investigators said.
Banegas Rodriguez was sentenced to 27 months in federal prison and was ordered to pay $533,043 in restitution, federal officials announced July 21.
• Another Honduran national, Jose Melgar-Rivas, 34, is accused of resisting arrest and impeding a federal officer when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement stopped his vehicle in Oklahoma City on July 15.
The complaint alleges Melgar-Rivas refused the officers’ demand to exit the vehicle, and as the officers attempted to remove him from the vehicle “a struggle ensued.” Melgar-Rivas “put the vehicle into drive and fled the scene,” the government alleges. An ICE officer was trapped in the door of the vehicle and was dragged down the street until he freed himself but reportedly sustained several injuries.
Melgar-Rivas was arrested several hours later and remains in federal detention pending further court hearings.
• Alexander Enemias Ortiz-Gonzalez, 23, a Guatemalan national, was arrested by Tulsa police on Dec. 30, 2024, for drunken driving, officers said. While Ortiz- Gonzalez was being booked into jail, his fingerprint record showed he had an outstanding warrant from Minnesota for fleeing from a police officer.
In addition, Ortiz-Gonzalez was previously deported from Louisiana in 2023.
He was sentenced in Tulsa’s federal district court to eight months in prison, and is expected to be deported again afterward.
• Jesus Sebastian Herrera Chavez, 21, pleaded guilty in Tulsa’s federal court on July 3 to brandishing a semi-automatic rifle during an assault on a Native American Aug. 25, 2024, while in Indian Country. The Mexican national, who entered the U.S. without permission, awaits sentencing.
Other cases Five men who entered the U.S. without authorization have been charged with firearm violations, five others are named in drug charges, two illegal aliens were arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol, and one is accused of conjoint robbery.
Jesus Omar Sanchez Nuñez, 36, of Oklahoma City, who faces trial the week of Aug. 12 on a charge of distribution of methamphetamine, was previously expelled from the United States twice in 2008, once in 2010 and again in 2011, records show.
Marcos Javier Suazo-Mancilla, 23, a Mexican national previously deported in 2018, was sentenced in Tulsa’s federal court recently to 22.5 years in prison. Law enforcement officers found 26 pounds of methamphetamine in his residence and another 39 pounds of meth in an auto body shop he rented, along with 41 grams of cocaine, seven guns, and more than $9,000 cash.
Additionally, 43 other people from Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico are charged in Oklahoma’s three federal district courts solely with illegal reentry into the U.S.
They were arrested in various locations in Oklahoma, including Bryan County, Seminole, Wagoner, Poteau, Ardmore, Sallisaw, Coalgate, Heavener, Cherokee County, Tulsa and Oklahoma City.
Most of the detainees had been apprehended multiple times. Seven of them had been deported three times before, and eight were removed on two previous occasions Among them was Adelby Isloa Martinez Mendez, 36, of Honduras, who was removed from the United States in 2019 and again in 2023. Furthermore, he was permanently barred from reentering the United States after felony convictions in New York.
Antonio Monge-Aguirre, 52, of Oklahoma City; Rodrigo Diaz-Ruedas, 32, whom an ICE deportation officer encountered in the Oklahoma County Jail; and Gilberto Israel Gonzalez-Morales, 48, of Oklahoma City, have all been deported five times.
Diaz-Ruedas – deported from the U.S. three times in 2016, once in 2018 and again in 2023 – pleaded guilty July 23 to illegal reentry and was sentenced to 16 months in federal prison. Monge-Aguirre – kicked out of the U.S. in 2011, 2012, 2013, 2023 and 2024 – is scheduled for trial on the Oklahoma City federal court’s Aug. 12 jury docket. Gonzalez- Morales – removed from the U.S. twice in 2012, once in 2013, in 2014 and again in 2018 – pleaded guilty July 22 and awaits sentencing.