Prison Release Leads to Deportation
An illegal immigrant from Honduras convicted of attempting to murder her newborn baby on Long Island has now been deported from the United States after serving eight years in prison, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
Federal immigration officials confirmed that Soili Xiomara Aparicio-Santos was removed from the country in April following her release from a New York prison. Her case is drawing renewed attention not only because of the disturbing nature of the crime itself, but also because DHS says she had already been under a final order of removal dating back to 2014 — the same year she illegally entered the United States during the Obama administration.
Aparicio-Santos, now 41, had been living in Centereach in Suffolk County on Long Island. In 2018, she was convicted on multiple felony charges, including second-degree attempted murder, attempted assault and endangering the welfare of a child.
According to local reports, the case stemmed from a horrifying incident in 2017 when Aparicio-Santos allegedly attempted to suffocate her newborn son with a pillow shortly after giving birth. A family member reportedly witnessed the attack and alerted authorities before the infant suffered serious injuries. The child survived and was later placed into foster care.
Initially, Aparicio-Santos received a 16-year prison sentence. DHS officials say that sentence was later reduced to 10 years, and she ultimately served eight years before being released into ICE custody for deportation proceedings.
Federal officials emphasized that cooperation from local law enforcement agencies played a key role in ensuring her removal from the country. ICE first lodged an immigration detainer against Aparicio-Santos after her initial arrest by Suffolk County police in 2017. A second detainer was issued while she remained incarcerated.
DHS Acting Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis praised local authorities for coordinating with federal immigration agents ahead of Aparicio-Santos’ release.
“Thanks to cooperation by law enforcement and our ICE officers, this barbaric criminal is out of our country,” Bis said in a statement released by DHS.
Bis described the crime in blunt terms, saying Aparicio-Santos “attempted to KILL her own child the day he was born,” while also criticizing the Obama administration for allowing her to remain in the country after entering illegally.
DHS continues to argue that local-federal partnerships remain essential for removing dangerous criminal offenders from the country. In its statement, the agency said jurisdictions refusing to cooperate with ICE often make it harder for federal officers to locate and arrest individuals after they are released back into communities.
“When politicians bar local law enforcement from working with DHS,” the agency stated, “law enforcement officers have to have a more visible presence to find and apprehend the criminals let out of jails and back into communities.”