Hourly Update

Border agents arrest convicted child molester

A man convicted of child molestation in Florida was arrested this week by Border Patrol agents on the Tohono O'odham Indian Reservation. Agents apprehended a 24-year-old Mexican man about 6 p.m. Tuesday southwest of Sells as the man tried to cross into the country illegally, said Richard DeWitt, spokesman for the agency's Tucson Sector. A records check revealed Thursday that the man had been convicted in April 2006 of lewd and lascivious behavior with someone less than 12 years old in Highlands County, Fla., DeWitt said. He had been previously deported this year out of El Paso, he said. The man will be processed for removal and charged criminally with re-entry of an aggravated felon, he said. Border Patrol officials estimate that about 10 percent of the people they catch have criminal records. Recent data seems to bear that out. From Oct. 1 through June 15, 31,152 — or 11 percent — of the 288,018 apprehensions made in the Tucson Sector were illegal entrants with criminal records, said DeWitt, citing the latest figures available. During the same time in 2006, 28,592 — or 9 percent — of the 313,645 apprehensions had criminal records, he said.