A Honduran national facing multiple child sex crime charges was arrested by ICE on September 15 in Fairfax County, Virginia, federal officials say — more than a year after the same county's jail released him without honoring a federal detainer. Oscar Evaristo Nunez, identified by the Department of Homeland Security as a Honduran national living in the country illegally, now faces one count of aggravated sexual battery involving a parent and child aged 13 to 17, two counts of nonconsensual filming or videotaping of an undressed minor, and two counts of aggravated sexual battery of a victim under 13 years old.
DHS says Nunez was first arrested locally on August 27, 2025, on aggravated sexual battery charges involving children and offenses tied to filming an undressed minor without consent, according to the New York Post. ICE lodged a detainer with the Fairfax County Adult Detention Center two days later, on August 29, 2025, but county authorities released Nunez without notifying federal agents, per DHS. Nunez was eventually returned to federal custody after that release, and DHS announced his September 15 arrest as part of a targeted enforcement operation.
ICE Washington, D.C. Field Office Director Robert Guadian framed the gap in custody starkly, saying Fairfax County's refusal to honor the detainer allowed “an alleged child sex predator to potentially re-offend until ICE officers could take him off the streets.” Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin added that ICE took “another criminal illegal alien off the streets without help from sanctuary politicians in Fairfax County,” saying Nunez had been arrested for child sex crimes in August 2025 before the county released him after refusing ICE's detainer, the outlet reported. DHS also said Nunez entered the United States illegally near Arizona around September 2003 and remains in ICE custody pending immigration proceedings. A Fairfax County representative did not respond to Fox News Digital's request for comment at the time of publication.
Why Fairfax County Won't Hold Inmates on Detainers Alone
The release traces back to a policy the Fairfax County Sheriff's Office reaffirmed in July 2024, which bars jail staff from holding inmates past their court-ordered release dates based solely on administrative civil ICE detainers. The sheriff's office requires a judicial order or a criminal warrant signed by a court before it will extend anyone's detention, maintaining that holding people on detainers alone would violate Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment protections against unlawful seizure and due process.
That stance dates back to May 2018, when then-Sheriff Stacey A. Kincaid formally terminated the county's Intergovernmental Service Agreement with ICE, ending a policy that had allowed jail officials to hold inmates up to 48 hours beyond their release times for federal pickup. Under Code of Virginia § 53.1-218, sheriffs statewide are still required to determine the residency status of booking arrestees and transmit fingerprint data to databases ICE can access — meaning Fairfax County does notify federal databases at booking even as it declines to act as an extended detention facility without a court order.
Congressional Pressure Over Fairfax County Policies
The disputes have also drawn congressional scrutiny. In January 2026, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan and Subcommittee Chairman Tom McClintock sent formal letters to Fairfax County Sheriff Stacey Kincaid and Commonwealth's Attorney Steve Descano launching oversight into the county's non-cooperation policies, according to the House Judiciary Committee. In August 2026, DHS separately called on Governor Abigail Spanberger and Fairfax County officials to keep a second-degree murder suspect in custody after ICE lodged a detainer on the day he was apprehended in Lanham, Maryland, as reported by Patch.
A Broader Regional Divide Over Immigration Cooperation
Spanberger, a Democrat who took office as Virginia's governor in January 2026, has directed state agencies to terminate agreements with ICE under the federal 287(g) program, a move DHS says aligns with the sanctuary-style posture federal officials are criticizing across Northern Virginia. The pattern extends beyond Fairfax: in neighboring Alexandria, local directives updated in October 2025 explicitly prohibit city police from sharing automated license plate reader surveillance data with federal civil immigration authorities, as Hoodline's earlier reporting detailed.
For now, Nunez remains in ICE custody pending immigration proceedings, DHS says, while the underlying local criminal charges from his 2025 arrest remain tied to the Fairfax County case that first drew federal attention to his status.
