Stephanie Minter, a 41-year-old single mother, was waiting at a bus stop in the Washington, D.C., suburb of Fairfax County, Virginia, on February 23, when Abdul Jalloh, an illegal immigrant from Sierra Leone with a long criminal record, approached and suddenly began slashing her with a knife. Minutes later, she was dead.
The case has caused a sensation in the D.C. area, with local media focusing on the role that lenient policies by Fairfax County’s progressive prosecutor and sheriff might have played in the horrific event. The prosecutor, Stephen Descano, has a policy of shaping criminal charges to avoid putting defendants at risk of deportation. The sheriff, Stacey Kincaid, will not hold illegal immigrant detainees for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) without a judicial warrant, which for technical reasons are rarely obtained in these cases.
