LAFAYETTE, La. – United States Attorney David C. Joseph announced that an illegal alien from Mexico was sentenced last week to two and a half years in prison for reentering the United States after being deported four times.

Fernando Garcia-Lopez, 37, of Tumbiscatio, Michocan, Mexico, was sentenced Friday by U.S. District Judge Elizabeth E. Foote on one count of illegal reentry of an illegal alien. According to the February 1, 2018 guilty plea, Vermilion Parish Sheriff’s deputies conducted a controlled buy of marijuana on March 9, 2017 at Garcia-Lopez’s Abbeville, Louisiana, residence. He was arrested and provided a false identity to law enforcement. After his actual identity was discovered, he was also found to have been deported in 2010, 2012, 2013 and 2015.

Homeland Security Investigations and the Vermilion Parish Sheriff’s Office conducted the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert F. Moore prosecuted the case.