United States Secures Extradition of More Than a Dozen Fugitives from 10 Countries

Extensive coordination and cooperation efforts between the U.S. Department of Justice and law enforcement authorities in Colombia, the Dominican Republic, France, Guatemala, Honduras, Israel, the Kyrgyz Republic, Mexico, Spain, and the United Kingdom resulted in the extraditions this month of alleged murderers, a child rapist, an MS-13 leader, an alien smuggler, Colombian drug traffickers, a Russian cybercriminal, a Nigerian fraudster, and an immigration scammer.

“The dedicated, persistent work of the Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs with foreign partners resulted in the extradition of fugitives wanted in the United States for violent crimes,” said Head of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division Matthew R. Galeotti. “The Justice Department will aggressively pursue and bring to justice in the United States transnational criminals and hold them accountable for the death and violence they have committed here and abroad.”

The fugitives extradited to the United States in March 2025 include:

• Eswin Mejia, 28, was extradited from Honduras to face charges of vehicular homicide and failure to appear in court for the January 2016 killing of 21-year-old Sarah Root in Douglas County, Nebraska. Mejia was arrested and released on bond in February 2016 and subsequently fled the country to evade prosecution by the Douglas County Attorney’s Office.
• Rigoberto Ramon Miranda-Orozco, 48, an alleged leader of a Guatemala-based alien smuggling organization, was extradited from Guatemala to face charges in the Western District of Texas for his alleged role in the June 2022 San Antonio mass casualty incident that resulted in the death of 53 Guatemalan, Honduran, and Mexican nationals, including children, and the injury of 11 others.
• Moises Humberto Rivera Luna, 55, an alleged international leader of the violent gang MS-13, was extradited from Guatemala to face racketeering conspiracy charges in the District of Columbia regarding racketeering activities to include murder, narcotics distribution, extortion, robberies, obstruction of justice, and other crimes.
• Carlos Espino Farfan, 36, was extradited from Spain to face charges of first-degree felony rape of a child and first-degree felony sodomy upon a child filed by the Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office.
• Jair Alberto Alvarez Valenzuela, 54, and Luis Carlos Diaz Martinez, 32, former Colombian Navy personnel were extradited to face charges in the Middle District of Florida for their alleged role in selling locations of Colombian Navy drug interdiction vessels to international drug traffickers.
• Louie Hernandez, 61, was extradited from Mexico to face charges in King County, Washington, of first-degree murder in connection with the February 2024 fatal shooting of his alleged estranged partner, Reyna Hernandez.
• Juan Ramirez, 37, was extradited from Mexico to face charges in Santa Clara, California, for the March 22, 2013, fatal stabbing of 29-year-old Sandra Cruzes-Gonsalez.
• Solomon Sincler Gheorghe, 20, an Irish national, was extradited from France to face charges in Cabarrus County, North Carolina, of felony death by motor vehicle and felony serious injury by vehicle. Gheorghe is alleged to have been impaired by alcohol and drugs when he caused a multi-vehicle wreck on Sept. 20, 2023, resulting in the deaths of two adults and a 12-year-old boy, and with injury to others.
• Rostislav Panev, 51, a dual Russian and Israeli national, was extradited from Israel to faces charges in the District of New Jersey for his alleged role as a developer for the LockBit ransomware group from its inception in or around 2019 through at least February 2024. The LockBit group has attacked more than 2,500 victims in at least 120 countries around the world, including 1,800 in the United States.
• Marco Tulio Fernandez-Rodriguez, 24, a citizen of the Dominican Republic, was extradited from the Dominican Republic to face charges in the Southern District of New York of murder, narcotics, and firearms in connection with his alleged role in an attempted gunpoint robbery of a Mount Vernon, New York, warehouse that sold various unlicensed marijuana and nicotine products. Two people — one employee of the warehouse and one member of the roughly 15-man robbery crew — were shot and killed during the failed robbery attempt.
• Ehis Lawrence Akhimie, 41, a Nigerian national, was extradited from the United Kingdom to face charges in the Southern District of Florida for allegedly engaging in a transnational criminal organization that operated an inheritance fraud scheme targeting elder U.S. consumers.
• Bikramjit Ahluwalia, 39, a dual citizen of the United Kingdom and the United Arab Emirates living in Dubai, was extradited from Spain to face charges in the Western District of North Carolina of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, money laundering conspiracy, conspiracy to damage a protected computer, and wire fraud for his alleged role in an extensive tech support fraud scheme.
• Danhong “Jean” Chen, also known as Maria Sofia Taylor, 60, a San Jose, California, immigration attorney, was extradited from the Kyrgyz Republic to face charges in the Northern District of California for allegedly committing visa fraud and related crimes to obtain immigration benefits for more than 100 foreign investors through the government’s Employment-Based Immigration Fifth Preference, or “EB-5,” visa program. Chen is the first extradition from the Kyrgyz Republic to the United States on federal criminal charges.

The Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs provided significant assistance in securing the defendants’ arrests and extraditions along with the U.S. Marshals Service. The Justice Department thanks and acknowledges the instrumental role of its law enforcement partners in Colombia, the Dominican Republic, France, Guatemala, Honduras, Israel, the Kyrgyz Republic, Mexico, Spain and the United Kingdom for making these extraditions possible.

An indictment is merely an allegation. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.