A Suffolk County judge let a previously deported illegal immigrant with four felony drunk-driving convictions walk out of court without bail — a decision ICE says puts foreign criminals above the safety of every American on the road.
Judge Bryan Browns ignored prosecutors' request to hold Salvadoran national Pablo Aguilar-Alvarez, 36, pending his October 2 sentencing, instead releasing him back into the community after a jury convicted him on his fourth felony DWI in ten years. Aguilar-Alvarez faces up to seven years in prison but is now free until then, classified as a flight risk — which, given that he already snuck back into the country after deportation, seems like an understatement.
ICE didn't mince words. "The county judge should focus on public safety, not making excuses for refusing to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement," an agency spokesperson told the New York Post. "ICE will do everything in its power to find, detain, and remove this criminal illegal alien from American communities."
Aguilar-Alvarez's record reads like an indictment of the entire system. A misdemeanor DUI in 2012. Felony DWI convictions stretching back to 2017. Deported in March 2024 after his third felony DWI — only to re-enter the country illegally. Arrested again in November after his panicked girlfriend called police from a Southampton gas station where he had stopped to pick up more booze. Southampton officers caught him blowing through a stop sign and crossing the double yellow line. ICE says his criminal history also includes drug possession and weapons possession charges.
ICE lodged a detainer after the November arrest. Local law enforcement ignored it — as they have every time one has been lodged against Aguilar-Alvarez. This is sanctuary jurisprudence in practice: a revolving door where foreign nationals with serial felony convictions are shielded from federal enforcement at every turn.
Judge Browns previously worked with the Suffolk County Branch of the Legal Aid Society — the same nonprofit that represented Aguilar-Alvarez in this latest case, according to Suffolk DA Ray Tierney. The New York State Office of Court Administration did not respond to requests for comment. Browns has held DUI defendants without bail before, including a Polish national who fled after a fatal drunken crash in 2022, so the judge knows the stakes. He simply chose differently here.
The broader picture underscores the scale of the problem. ICE is now stationing deportation officers at TSA checkpoints in at least nine states, working with advance passenger data to intercept visa overstayers before they board flights, the Washington Examiner reported. Daily illegal immigrant arrests hit roughly 1,600 nationwide as of early July — the highest in Trump's second term. The agency is stretched thin, and every local jurisdiction that refuses to honor detainers makes the job harder.
Aguilar-Alvarez is due back in court in two months. Whether he shows up is an open question — and whether ICE can find him first is one every Long Island driver should be asking.
