BANGOR, Maine — Two illegal aliens have been sentenced in U.S. District Court to time served for illegal re-entry.
Saul Canizales-Osuna, 57, of Albuquerque, N.M., was arrested on Oct. 9 when he walked off a cruise ship in Bar Harbor. He is a native of Mexico.
Pedro Miguel Pereira Gloria, 34, of Perdigao Anadia, Portugal, was found wandering in late December in the Houlton area looking for the New Jersey man who was supposed to pick him up after he crossed the border on foot.
Both had been held without bail since their arrests.
The fact that Canizales-Osuna was in the country illegally was discovered during a routine review of the advance passenger information system. Customs officials discovered the day before the ship docked that he had been deported in June 1998 because he was considered an aggravated felon. He was convicted in June 1995 in Los Angeles of possession and-or sale of methamphetamine and of assault with a firearm, according to court documents.
Those convictions barred him from re-entering the U.S.
He served about three years in prison and was deported on June 9, 1998, according to court documents. He told U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents when he was arrested in Bar Harbor that he had returned to the U.S. at the Tijuana, Mexico, crossing the day after he was deported using his resident alien or green card as identification.
Immigration officials apparently mistakenly returned the card to Canizales-Osuna instead of keeping it when he was deported more than 10 years ago.
He returned to the U.S. to be with his family and turned his life around, Virginia Villa, the federal public defender who represented Canizales-Osuna, said at his sentencing on June 16.
“It is somewhat ironic that all of his family members are somehow involved in the legal system,” Villa wrote in her sentencing memorandum urging leniency. “His wife and one daughter are paralegals, another daughter works in the California prison system, and his son is a police officer. He has received letters of support from a wide section of the community, including a deputy sheriff, employers, family members and friends. This support is a reflection of the support he has, in turn, given to those around him.”
Canizales-Osuna and his wife are planning to relocate to Mexico, according to Villa.
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