ICE New York City officers have arrested Sobirjon Sobirov Khusen Ugli, 35, a citizen of Uzbekistan, near his home in Brooklyn — more than three years after Biden’s Border Patrol encountered him illegally crossing near Lukeville, Arizona, and released him into the United States on his own recognizance.
ICE, which announced the arrest on Monday, called him a “criminal illegal alien” and said Biden’s Border Patrol first encountered him in April 2023 after he crossed with a group of 110 people. He was released without bond, on a promise to appear, and given a notice to appear for immigration proceedings in New York City. He reported once, in May 2024 — still during the Biden government — and never again. ICE said he will be held in its custody pending removal proceedings. It gave no removal date and did not name a detention facility.
In 2013, ICE said, “Sobirov was arrested for, and admitted to, the murder of his then-girlfriend in Thailand, stuffing her in a suitcase, and dumping the suitcase in a canal, according to press reports.”
Contemporaneous coverage in The Nation of Thailand matches that account and an admission, under a different spelling of the name, Sobiyon Sobirov. The paper said that after interrogation the then-23-year-old confessed that on August 13, 2013, he assaulted his girlfriend of one year, Lyla Nilufar, 24, after she asked for money back and scolded his mother. He claimed he did not intend to kill her and that she fell down the stairs to her death. He said he bought a suitcase the next day, stuffed her body in it, and dumped it in Bangkok’s Phra Khanong canal. The body was found at the Phra Khanong water pumping station; police arrested him the next day at the Winning Condominium in Pridi Banomyong Soi 40, after a tip from a security guard.
The Bangkok Post later reported that he “admitted he murdered his girlfriend,” and that a woman named Muninova Nikola told police a photograph circulated as copied from the dead woman’s passport was actually her — and that she was alive. The paper said a cousin had identified the body as Lyla Nilufar’s, and that investigators were waiting for more information from the embassy. There was still a body; the passport photograph was not a clean identification. Neither Thai report nor ICE’s own release cites a Thai court conviction or sentence.
The same release said he was convicted of felony theft in Uzbekistan in 2020 and sentenced to five years in prison. It also said he was arrested by the New York Police Department for harassing communication and was subject to a 2024 restraining order issued by the Kings County Criminal Court in Brooklyn. The agency gave no date, victim, or outcome for that arrest, and did not describe it as a conviction.
“ICE’s mission is to protect the American public, and that includes taking appropriate enforcement action against illegal aliens charged with serious crimes,” said ICE New York City Field Office Director Kenneth Genalo. “Our officers work every day to identify, arrest and remove criminal illegal aliens before they can cause further harm in our communities. We particularly target public safety threats like Sobirjon Sobirov. We will continue to work to ensure individuals who pose a public safety threat are held accountable under both criminal and immigration law.”
