Feds drop hammer on illegal slated for parole despite killing 2 Americans in fiery crash

The top federal prosecutor in Los Angeles said Wednesday that he has charged an illegal immigrant who, despite a lengthy criminal record and being sentenced to a decade behind bars for killing a California couple in a 2021 drunken-driving crash, was expected to be paroled this summer.

Bilal Essayli, the U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California, said his office filed a reentry after deportation charge against Oscar Eduardo Ortega-Anguiano, 43, in light of the coming July parole date for the twice-deported Mexican national.    

“My office has filed a felony immigration charge against this defendant. He faces up to 20 years in federal prison if convicted,” Mr. Essayli said on X.

“If the State of California will not seek the full measure of justice against this individual, the Justice Department will,” he said.

While illegal immigration is not itself a felony, doing so after one has been deported is a federal offense carrying lengthy prison terms.

Mr. Essayli was reacting to a Fox News report that said California prison officials were preparing to release Ortega-Anguiano after serving just three years of his 10-year sentence for killing a young couple, Anya Varfolomeev and Nikolay Osokin, in the November 2021 crash.

Court records said Ortega-Anguiano was drunk and high when he raced down the Interstate 405 freeway at nearly 100 mph and slammed into the couple’s car by Seal Beach.

Varfolomeev and Osokin, both American citizens, were burned alive in the wreckage.  

In 2022, Ortega-Anguiano was sentenced to 10 years behind bars after being convicted of gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated. He was sentenced to a decade for each of the two deaths but the judge allowed the sentences to be served concurrently.

“It’s disgusting. You have two young, unbelievable future, productive American citizens killed for nothing and that illegal immigrant who already has been deported twice is going to be released again? For what?” Anatoly Varfolomeev, Anya’s father, told Fox News. “If even he is deported, he will come back.”

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi pledged her support for the Los Angeles federal attorney’s stance.

“This is absolutely unconscionable. What about Justice for these teens? What about the rights of their parents? The Justice Department will work with ICE to make sure this illegal alien receives full punishment for his crimes,” she said on social media.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement said Ortega-Anguiano had prior convictions in the U.S. for burglary in 2005, car theft in 2007 and battery on a spouse with kidnapping in 2014.

He was first deported in December 2016, federal officials said.

Ortega-Anguiano tried to reenter the U.S. with phony documents in February 2018, but was caught and recommended for criminal charges for attempting to get back into the country.

Instead, he was ordered removed in June of that same year.

Ortega-Anguiano sneaked back into the U.S. at an unknown later date and was off immigration authorities’ radar until his involvement in the deadly crash.