Federal authorities snared a child molester, a rapist and an accused killer in a sophisticated operation that has rid Southern California of hundreds of criminal illegal migrants.
The mission, called “Operation Guardian Angel,” has so far collared 362 previously deported illegal migrants using federal law to defeat California’s controversial “sanctuary state” rule prohibiting local police from cooperating with immigration agents even if they wanted to.
During a recent action, The California Post watched as federal agents rushed from an Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office at the Roybal Federal Building and sped across downtown Los Angeles to the infamous Twin Towers jail, where they grabbed criminal migrants from county custody.
“We’re writing federal warrants in real time, so we can force jails to hand criminal aliens over to our custody before they’re released,” LA’s top federal prosecutor, Bill Essayli, told The Post.
“It’s keeping bad guys from ever getting back out into the streets.”
Under “Operation Guardian Angel,” the feds identify foreign nationals arrested by police for local crimes and quickly hit them with new, federal charges so ICE officers can take them in to custody before they’re released back into the public.
Local jails are legally required to hand over criminal illegal migrants when presented with federal warrants.
The operation is currently active in the six Southern California counties in Essayli’s jurisdiction: Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara and Ventura.
During an operation last week, a group of seven migrants that emerged from the belly of Twin Towers had been recently arrested and charged with crimes including domestic battery, reckless driving causing injury and illegal firearms possession
All of them had been previously convicted of entering the US illegally and subsequently deported, making them eligible for federal felony charges of illegal reentry.
Some faced the possibility of other getting hit with other federal crimes, and many had lengthy rap sheets.
Several of the men arrested told their stories to The Post at the processing center beneath the Roybal building.
Lauro Alberto Rivas — whose criminal record included arrests and convictions for weapons offenses, grand theft and drunk driving — said he’d already served eight months in jail for carrying a gun in a public space.
Rivas was glad to be headed back to Mexico, he said.
“I regret what I did. I understand I make mistakes,” he said. “I want to be sent home now. I want to see my family.”
Daniel Garcia had been arrested by cops in Gardena 15 days earlier on a domestic battery charge. He’d been previously deported for illegal entry to the US years ago and had an otherwise clean rap sheet.
To gain entry to the US this time, Garcia said he paid $10,000 to a human smuggler who led him across the Mexican border on foot. He said he owed money to the drug cartels in his hometown of Morelos, and he was terrified to go back.
“The cartels take everything,” he said. “All my life is here now.”
Raul Aranda Gutierrez said had been arrested a couple of days prior for a car wreck that injured two women badly. He was originally charged with felony DUI but had been prosecuted for reckless driving.
“It was an accident,” he claimed.
Gutierrez, whose criminal history includes convictions for drunk driving and violating a domestic protection order, said he’d snuck into the US across the Mexican border and would do so again if he was deported.
Other defendants taken into federal custody under “Operation Guardian Angel,” which is part of a Homeland Security Task Force initiative, include:
- Jaime Rodríguez Ladesma, 70, of Long Beach, an illegal migrant from Mexico who was convicted in 2023 of lewd or lascivious acts with a child under 14. Ladesma was deported in December 2023, before illegally returning again, where he was convicted of illegally re-entering the U.S.
- Héctor Bueno-Moreno, 55, of San Luis Obispo, an illegal migrant from Mexico who was deported in September 2001 and January 2020. His criminal history includes a 1995 rape conviction in Kern County.
- José Cristian Saravia-Sánchez, 31, of Mexico, was removed from the United States in 2013 and returned illegally. He is accused of shooting and killing an Inglewood man, who tried to stop him from stealing a catalytic converter 2025. His rap sheet includes 11 arrests between June 2022 and August 2024. California’s “sanctuary state” laws prevented local law enforcement from complying with an immigration detainer request on his previous arrests, federal authorities said.
“The purpose of Operation Guardian Angel is to neutralize these sanctuary state policies,” Essayli said.
Thomas Giles, director of the LA field office for ICE enforcement and removal operations, added that California’s politicians are “forcing local law enforcement agencies to release criminal illegal aliens back into our communities.”
Giles said Operation Guardian Angel allows the federal government to keep “rapists, gang members, and murderers, who shouldn’t be in the U.S. at all,” away from the law-abiding citizens of California.
“We will not be deterred,” said Giles, who added that “Operation Guardian Angel” allows the federal government to keep “rapists, gang members, and murderers, who shouldn’t be in the US at all,” away from the law-abiding citizens.
“We are not going away.”
