Murder supect released by maryland jail picked up by ice to face justice

BALTIMORE, MD — U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested a Guatemalan national on April 12 after a Maryland county jail released him despite a federal immigration detainer, ICE officials announced Monday.

Rene Pop-Chub, 32, was taken into custody by ICE officers in Hyattsville, Maryland, four days after the Prince George’s County Department of Corrections declined to honor a detainer request. Pop faces pending charges including murder, first- and second-degree assault, and reckless endangerment stemming from a 2024 arrest by Prince George’s County Police.

“The arrest of Rene Pop-Chub underscores the critical importance of cooperation between federal and local counterparts,” said ICE Baltimore Acting Field Office Director Nikita Baker. “When jurisdictions refuse to honor our immigration detainers, they put their own communities at risk.”

According to ICE, Pop is a repeat immigration violator who was first apprehended by U.S. Border Patrol on June 13, 2013, in Falfurrias, Texas, and deported to Guatemala that September. He was again arrested after unlawfully reentering the U.S. in Arizona in 2017 and was deported a second time on December 28 of that year.

Authorities say Pop reentered the country a third time at an unknown location. He was arrested by local police on August 19, 2024, on assault charges. ICE lodged a detainer with the Prince George’s County jail on October 9, 2024. On October 31, the local district court transferred his case to the circuit court on multiple charges, including murder.

Despite the active detainer, Pop was released by the jail on April 8, 2025. ICE tracked and arrested him in Hyattsville four days later. He has since been transferred to the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service.

Key Points

Rene Pop-Chub, a Guatemalan national charged with murder, was released from Maryland custody despite an ICE detainer.
ICE previously deported Pop twice, in 2013 and 2017; he reentered the U.S. illegally for a third time.
ICE arrested him April 12 in Hyattsville; he is now in U.S. Marshals Service custody.

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