A 14-year-old Southern California high school student was struck by an illegal immigrant drunk driver while riding his bicycle.
Jose Abelardo Villegas-Orbe, 47, an illegal Mexican national, has been charged with vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated and DUI hit-and-run causing death, plus a probation violation following the Oct. 10 accident.
One of the victims, Liam Cantu, 14, suffered serious injuries that required emergency brain surgery. Cantu was struck by Villegas-Orbe while riding his bicycle with another teen on Highway 111 in La Quinta, Calif., local outlet KESQ News Channel 3 reported.
He died two weeks later at the hospital, and his death has created another family mourning the loss of their child because of President Joe Biden’s lenient immigration policies and California’s careless catch-and-release rules.
The driver fled the scene before authorities arrived, but was later found and detained in La Quinta. The driver, identified as Villegas-Orbe, of Palm Springs, Calif., was arrested, police said, and had two previous DUI arrests.
TRAGIC LOSS: Jose Abelardo Villegas-Orbe, a 47-year-old Mexican illegal, has been charged with vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated and DUI hit-and-run causing death after a crash on October 10, 2025, in La Quinta, California, which resulted in the death of 14-year-old La… pic.twitter.com/TcUjyuLn3G
— Just the Facts (@Daniell39173501) November 1, 2025
He remained in the country due to the Biden administration’s immigration policies, according to multiple federal law enforcement sources who spoke to Fox News’ Bill Melugin.
“The Biden admin ICE never sought to arrest him because he didn’t meet Biden admin immigration enforcement priorities at the time,” Melugin shared on X.
BREAKING: Per multiple federal law enforcement sources, the suspect charged w/ killing a SoCal high school student in a DUI hit & run crash this month is a Mexican illegal alien with two prior DUI arrests in CA in 2024, but the Biden admin ICE never sought to arrest him because… pic.twitter.com/n8k5F4Nov0
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) October 31, 2025
Villegas-Orbe was arrested for DUI in August 2024 and November 2024, both in Riverside County, Calif. The DUI arrests were misdemeanors and were not enforced by local authorities or under the Biden administration’s lax immigration policies, Fox News Digital reported.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not lodge an immigration detainer for Villegas-Orbe, meaning Biden’s ICE made no effort to take custody of him or deport him after the arrests.
Under the Trump administration, ICE did file a detainer request with local law enforcement for the hit-and-run death arrest.
“He is now accused of a third DUI, that has tragically taken the life of a young boy,” Melugin shared on X, adding “CA’s sanctuary state law likely wouldn’t allow any cooperation even if the suspect made bail.”
Cantu, a La Quinta High School freshman, died from his injuries on Oct. 24, according to the Riverside County Sheriff’s Office.
News Channel 3 shared a statement from his high school and spoke to Cantu’s parents but did not mention Villegas-Orbe’s immigration status.
Police believe Villegas-Orbe was intoxicated at the time of the crash and may have been fleeing a separate hit-and-run in Indian Wells. Records show he was already on probation for a prior DUI offense.
In an article from Oct. 16, Cantu’s family said Villegas-Orbe was being chased by the victim in the Indian Wells accident at a high speed when he crashed into the boys on bicycles.
Liam’s parents, Jennifer Perez and Jesus Cantu, told News Channel 3 Cantu underwent emergency brain surgery and was put into a medically induced coma.
He survived the initial surgery, but pressure on his brain started to “shoot up really high.” His parents were praying for a miracle but said “they’re telling us that he’s gone.”
“We want to come on here and to tell the parents to hold their kids tight and watch over them a little more,” Cantu told New Channel 3. “The day that they lose, the day you put your guard down, something tragic like this can happen.”
Perez and Cantu described their son as someone who was funny, outgoing, enjoyed dancing and touched everyone in his life. He was excited to join the La Quinta High School baseball team.
“The baseball dads are calling me and telling me that their son wanted to quit baseball, and Liam motivated then to not quit, and to be better and help them. Everywhere we went, everyone always loved Liam,” his parents said.
The community also held a prayer ceremony for Cantu at the La Quinta High School baseball field.
Authorities said the other teen victim also sustained minor injuries but has been released from the hospital and is recovering at home.
News of this tragic hit-and-run accident at the hands of an illegal alien is the latest of several deadly car crashes to make headlines across the country.
On Oct. 21, Jashanpreet Singh, 21, was driving an 18-wheeler under the influence of drugs when he plowed into slow-moving traffic on Interstate 10 in Ontario, Calif. The Indian national crossed the southern border in 2022 and was released by the Biden administration.
The chain-reaction crash involved multiple vehicles and killed three people and injured several others. Dashcam footage shows Singh’s semi-truck striking the vehicles at a high rate of speed, leaving the vehicles mangled and one burst into flames.
The footage indicates he didn’t attempt to slow down. Local authorities arrested Singh on suspicion of gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated and driving under the influence.
Last week, an illegal immigrant from Honduras was charged in a fatal DUI car crash that killed two Illinois residents, including an elected official, in Westfield, Ill. Authorities said Edwin Pacheco-Meza, 34, was driving under the influence when his vehicle crossed the center line and struck an oncoming Ford F150 truck.
Pacheco-Meza did not have a valid driver’s license or insurance and Illinois State Police issued him several citations. The passenger in the car, Juan Morales-Martinez, 18, an illegal alien from Guatemala, was also arrested and charged with drug possession and a weapons offense.
Operation Midway Blitz is underway in Chicago in honor of another Illinois resident, Katie Abraham, who was tragically killed by a drunk-driving illegal alien in Illinois last January. That driver, Julio Cucul-Bol, who was using an alias and had falsified Mexican paperwork, also fled the scene and was apprehended on a bus headed for Mexico.
Angel Dad Joe Abraham recently penned an op-ed in the Chicago Tribune in support of Operation Midway Blitz, highlighting the need to arrest and deport criminal illegal aliens and keep his daughter’s legacy alive.
“Contrary to some of the criticism about it, this mission is not political,” he wrote. “It is moral. It is to prevent what happened to Katie from happening to anyone else. This will be only a small part of Katie’s legacy, but I’m proud to honor the beauty of her through this mission.”
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security shared the op-ed on social media and in a news release.
"My family and thousands of other angel families have become collateral damage to a reckless experiment of sanctuary cities and states. That is not compassion. That is exploitation." – Joe Abraham, Angel Father.https://t.co/Ax4QZKz13R
— Homeland Security (@DHSgov) October 31, 2025
“My family and thousands of other angel families have become collateral damage to a reckless experiment of sanctuary cities and states,” DHS shared from Abraham’s op-ed. “That is not compassion. That is exploitation.”
The operation targets the criminal illegal aliens who flocked to Chicago and Illinois because they knew Governor JB Pritzker and his sanctuary policies would protect them and allow them to roam free on American streets, DHS said.
ICE and Border Patrol have arrested more than 3,000 illegal aliens, including rapists, pedophiles, murderers, and gang members.
Joe Abraham said his own parents immigrated legally to this country in the 1960s. He added that Governor Pritzker is filling Illinois’ census rolls with unvetted illegal aliens simply to preserve congressional seats and get more federal funding. Katie paid for his scheme with her life, he said.
“It would be unjust and unreasonable to separate my family’s loss from the policies that failed us,” he wrote. “We did everything right. We worked hard, obeyed the law, paid our taxes, and trusted that government would protect us in return. That trust was broken. Our leaders — from the governor’s office on down — have treated immigration as a numbers game, not as a matter of public safety or national security.”
