ICE deports 75-year-old man wanted for death-squad killings during El Salvador’s civil war

A man who is wanted in El Salvador for murder and other crimes related to death squad killings in the country’s civil war has been deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Alvarado Benitez, 75, was deported by ICE officials in Philadelphia Friday and turned over to law enforcement authorities in El Salvador for his role in the killings, according to ICE. 

Members of the death squad are accused of kidnapping, torturing and murdering five civilians in the village of San Andrés in eastern El Salvador in April 1981. It is unclear what exact role Benitez played in the killings or how long he has been living in the U.S.

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The death squads were far-right paramilitary groups acting in opposition to Marxist–Leninist guerrilla forces, most notably the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMNL). The civil war in El Salvador began in October 1979 and lasted for more than 12 years. 

Cammilla Wamsley, the field office director of Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) in Philadelphia, said several agencies helped secure Benitez’s deportation to El Salvador to face charges. 

"The removal of Angel Anibal Alvarado Benitez is a triumph of cooperation between ERO Philadelphia, ERO Baltimore, HSI (Homeland Security Investigations) Baltimore, HSI San Salvador and ICE’s Human Rights Violators and War Crimes Center," Wamsley said. 

"It is our sincere hope that his return to face charges will help to bring some justice to the people of El Salvador for the atrocities suffered during their civil war."

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The agency’s efforts to investigate and ultimately return Alvarado Benitez to Salvadoran authorities were initiated and supported by ICE’s Human Rights Violators and War Crimes Center (HRVWCC) with the assistance of the HSI attaché in San Salvador. 

HRVWCC was established in 2008 to further ICE’s efforts to identify, track and prosecute human rights abusers, ICE said in a statement. It leverages the expertise of a group of agents, historians, lawyers, intelligence and research specialists, and analysts who direct the agency’s broader enforcement efforts against these offenders.

In June 2023, HSI and ERO in Baltimore administratively arrested Alvarado Benitez and served him with a notice to appear in immigration court for being present in the U.S. without inspection. 

ERO Baltimore transferred Benitez to ERO Philadelphia at the Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Philipsburg for deportation proceedings. The case was litigated by the Office of the Principal Legal Advisor in Baltimore and resulted in an order of removal to El Salvador by an immigration judge. On Feb. 9, Benitez’s order of removal became administratively final.

ERO conducts removals of individuals without a lawful basis to remain in the U.S., including at the order of immigration judges with the Justice Department’s Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR). Immigration judges in these courts make decisions based on the merits of each individual case, determining if a non-citizen is subject to a final order of removal or eligible for certain forms of relief from removal, ICE said.