YULEE, Fla. – A federal judge ordered an El Salvadoran man arrested nearly 12 hours after a Nassau County deputy was killed while pursuing him from a Yulee gas station held pending a detention hearing on Monday.
Francisco Portillo-Fuentes had been deported twice before, most recently within the past three months. He now faces felony charges of re-entry into the country, which carries a penalty of up to two years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
Portillo-Fuentes, 26, was arrested about 7:45 p.m. at Atlantic Self Storage on Powers Avenue following a manhunt involving the U.S. Marshal's Service, the Nassau County Sheriff's Office, the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office and the Florida Highway Patrol that began when he ran from the Border Patrol about 7:30 a.m. He was caught not far from where he had been living.
News4Jax learned that Portillo-Fuentes had been deported from the United States in 2011 and again sometime after an August 15, 2016, conviction for DUI. He had been arrested in a traffic stop on Philips Highway at 2:15 a.m. on May 15.
After he pleaded guilty to the DUI charge, he was transferred to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. According to federal court documents, he re-entered the United States a second time by wading across the Rio Grande River from Mexico to Loredo, Texas.
Portillo-Fuentes carries a penalty of up to two years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
CRIMINAL COMPLAINT: U.S. vs. Francisco Portillo-Fuentes
At an appearance Wednesday afternoon in Jacksonville federal court, Portillo-Fuentes told the judge, sometimes through an interpreter, that he has a third-grade education and has a wife and three children
His public defender asked for bail, but U.S. Magistrate Judge Joel B. Toomey ordered Portillo-Fuentes held pending a formal detention hearing at 2 p.m. Friday.
"I don't think he's going to be deported again," immigration attorney Stephen Davis said. " I think he is going to face some time here."
Law enforcement, community grieving loss of deputy
Nassau County Deputy Eric Oliver died after he was hit by an SUV while chasing Portillo-Fuentes across State Road 200 about 7:30 a.m. Tuesday.
"The grief and pain that our officers and employees feel from losing someone that they know and that they care about, who has dedicated his young life to his community, that's going to continue," Nassau County Sheriff Bill Leeper said.
RELATED: Nassau County deputy killed in chase described as 'hero'
According to Todd Bryant, division chief for the U.S. Border Patrol's Miami Sector, at least three of six men in a pickup truck located at a Gate gas station in Yulee were foreign nationals not authorized to be in the United States. Leeper said the men were living in Jacksonville and working as roofers in Nassau County.
As agents were placing the men under arrest and putting them in the Border Patrol vehicle, Portillo-Fuentes ran.
While a federal agent tried to aid Oliver, two of the men being questioned got back into the pickup and they drove off. The vehicle was stopped and the driver and passenger was arrested. None of the men detained by Border Patrol were named, but three are from Mexico, one from Costa Rica and one from Guatemala.