A 21-year-old illegal immigrant from Guyana, charged with murder and rape, would not have been walking the streets if New York were not designated a sanctuary city, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials stated earlier this week.

Reeaz Khan violently attacked, raped, and killed 92-year-old Maria Fuertes in Queens, New York, and is currently in jail awaiting trial.

In early January, the elderly woman was walking home when Khan attacked her. Fuertes was discovered unresponsive and unconscious with her clothes pulled above her waist, near her home outside in 32-degree weather. She died at a local hospital as a result of rib fractures and a broken spine after being strangled and sexually assaulted.

Khan claimed, “he fell down, his belt broke, his pants fell down and his penis fell near her vagina.” He later admitted that he lifted up her skirt and tried to put his penis inside of her, prosecutor Joseph Grasso said in court.

According to officials, Khan arrived in New York on a B-2 Visa that provides a six-month-visit for pleasure back in 2016. After failing to leave the United States when his Visa expired three years ago, Khan took advantage of New York’s “Sanctuary City” policies Mayor Bill de Blasio signed off on in 2014.

Khan was arrested last November for assaulting his father, but instead of being deported for his illegal status and assault charge, Khan was protected by the sanctuary city’s policy that protects criminal illegal aliens from arrest and deportation by ICE.

Within 40 days of being released back to the streets of New York, Khan brutally attacked Fuertes. Khan is currently being held in a New York City jail without bail on charges of second-degree murder, second-degree assault, sexual abuse, sexual abuse of a person incapable of consent, depraved indifference, and contact by forcible compulsion.

“It is made clear that New York City’s stance against honoring detainers is dangerously flawed. It was a deadly choice to release a man on an active ICE detainer back onto the streets after his first arrest included assault and weapon charges, and he now faces new charges, including murder,” said Thomas R. Decker of Enforcement and Removal Operations Field Offices New York. “New York City’s sanctuary policies continue to threaten the safety of all residents of the five boroughs, as they repeatedly protect criminal aliens who show little regard for the laws of this nation. In New York City alone, hundreds of arrestees are released each month with pending charges and/or convictions to return back into the communities where they committed their crimes, instead of being transferred into the custody of ICE. Clearly the politicians care more about criminal illegal aliens than the citizens they are elected to serve and protect.”