Guatemalan Man Sentenced for Illegal Re-Entry

SYRACUSE, NEW YORK – Rogelio Lopez-Lopez, a/k/a Hugo Gilardo Sales-Gomez, age 37, a Guatemalan citizen who was living in Chenango County, New York, was sentenced to serve 7-months in prison for unlawfully reentering the United States after previously being deported, announced United States Attorney Carla B. Freedman and Thomas Brophy, Field Office Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement-Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO), Buffalo Field Office.

As part of his guilty plea, the defendant admitted that he returned to the United States after being previously deported in 2006 and without making application to lawfully reenter. He came to the attention of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement-Enforcement-Removal Operations after being arrested by the Chenango County Sheriff’s Office for an assault charge. Following his conviction in Chenango County for Assault in the Third Degree, Lopez-Lopez was sentenced to serve 179 days in the Chenango County Jail. At the conclusion of that sentence, ICE-ERO arrested the defendant for the instant federal offense. 

The case was investigated by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement-Enforcement and Removal Operations (ICE-ERO) with assistance from the Chenango County Sheriff’s Office. Assistant U.S. Attorney Richard Southwick prosecuted the case.