Border Patrol nabs Tunisian man who overstayed visa after he allegedly tried to ‘purchase’ child

Border Patrol agents in New York arrested a Tunisian man with an expired visa after he allegedly tried to buy a child, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) said Monday.

The Perry Police Department arrested Monji Jelassi, a 64-year-old citizen from Tunisia, on Dec. 2 after a woman accused him of asking to “purchase” her five-year-old child and attempting to put him in his vehicle, according to CBP. Jelassi had a foreign-issued International Driver’s License at the time of his arrest before Border Patrol agents confirmed he also possessed an expired visa.

“Removing this individual is a matter of public safety and aligns with the interests of our law enforcement partners to remove predators and other dangerous people from our communities,” Patrol Agent in Charge David Banks said in a statement Monday.

Agents handed Jelassi to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) pending a deportation hearing, according to CBP.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) previously reported 853,955 overstays of individuals granted temporary permission to be in the U.S. in fiscal year 2022, making the overstay rate 3.67%.

The rate of foreign overstays has increased in the U.S. from 1.21% in fiscal year 2019, 1.48% in fiscal year 2020, and 2.67% in 2021, according to federal data.

Federal authorities attempting to remove overstays have been limited by DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’ January 2021 guidelines stating that removability should not be the sole reason for immigration enforcement.

“The fact [that] an individual is a removable noncitizen therefore should not alone be the basis of an enforcement action against them. We will use our discretion and focus our enforcement resources in a more targeted way. Justice and our country’s well-being require it,” Mayorkas wrote at the time.

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