Dem New Mexico judge resigns after alleged Tren de Aragua member found living in his home

Judge Joel Cano, the magistrate judge of Dona Ana County, New Mexico and a former police officer, allowed 23-year-old Cristhian Ortega-Lopez, who crossed the border illegally, to file a request for immigration relief using the judge's home address. Pictures from social media showed the alleged TdA member posing with the judge, Breitbart reported.

Ortega-Lopez was detained on charges of illegal possession of a firearm and also has ties to TdA, federal prosecutors have said. Earlier this year, President Donald Trump declared TdA a foreign terrorist organization.

Investigators with the Department of Justice were able to find pictures and video evidence of Ortega-Lopez and other illegal immigrants firing off rifles at a shooting range, and identified that Ortega-Lopez had tattoos associated with the TdA terror group.

The arrest followed a hearing where the prosecution said that he is a flight risk and has links to TdA. Court documents said that Ortega-Lopez entered the US via Eagle Pass, Texas in December 2023 at the height of the border crisis under former President Joe Biden.

He was taken to a detention facility at the time of his crossing, but due to overcrowding, he was released just three days later. After spending some time in El Paso, Texas, Ortega-Lopez met the judge's wife, Nancy Cano, and began doing some handyman jobs as well as construction. Ortega-Lopez was then given an offer by Cano to live in a casita on her property in New Mexico. Images that were obtained by the outlet that were on Ortega-Lopez's phone showed mutilated bodies, with some being decapitated.

Ortega-Lopez is currently in custody at Dona Ana County Detention Center on charges of being in the country illegally with firearms.