The two Mexican citizens who murdered a coworker at a Michigan business last summer were in the country illegally and worked for a dairy farm that was a registered user of the federal government’s E-Verify system, aimed at preventing unauthorized immigrants from attaining work, according to a federal law enforcement official and government data.
Siblings Francisca Vargas-Castillo and Leobardo Torres-Castillo separately entered plea deals in Michigan’s Sanilac County Circuit Court earlier this month for the death of Bricia Flores-Rivera, who had worked with the two at a farm north of Detroit.
The deceased victim, Flores-Rivera, had also been illegally present. A DHS official said the department does not know when the three entered the U.S. and how long they had been in the country.
Flores-Rivera’s body was found by a local law enforcement officer in Buel Township, Mich., Sept. 1, 2018. Her body was retrieved from a culvert, a tunnel meant to carry water under a road or railroad.