Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, is urging Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen to provide all information available on the suspect involved in the death of Mollie Tibbetts in Iowa last month.
Tibbetts’ body was found this week near her hometown of Brooklyn, Iowa, after she disappeared July 18 during a run. Cristhian Bahena Rivera was charged earlier this week with the death and has been accused by law enforcement officials of illegally living in the U.S. for four to seven years.
“It is crucial we understand the circumstances surrounding the tragic death of this young Iowan so that we can address any vulnerabilities in our border security apparatus, existing laws, enforcement practices, and resource allocation,” Grassley wrote in a letter to Nielsen. “We must prevent murders such as Tibbetts’ from ever occurring again.”
[More: Trump weighs in on Mollie Tibbett’s murder: ‘Should’ve never happened’]
Rivera’s lawyer Allan Richards has asserted that he was working legally in Iowa and that the government did not accurately characterize his immigration status. But a spokesperson for the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration services said that there is no evidence that Rivera “has any lawful immigration status.”
Nielsen told reporters earlier Wednesday that Rivera had been in the U.S. “unlawfully” and would not qualify to work legally in the U.S. unless he had been a recipient of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, but he was not. As a result, Iowa police are investigating how Rivera passed an E-Verify test in order to secure employment.
“At a minimum, Congress must increase law enforcement personnel at the border, aggressively modernize relevant technology and infrastructure, and eliminate the potential for fraud and abuse in our E-verify system,” Grassley wrote.
Grassley urged for any information any information on Rivera, including the Homeland Security Investigations Executive Summary on him, be provided to the committee by Aug. 24.
Rivera was an employee at Yarrabee Farms, which is owned by a family member of Iowa Republican Craig Lang.
“Craig Lang supports Cristhian’s right to be in this jurisdiction and for the government to support any other idea of status publicly flies in the face of such statement,” Richards wrote Wednesday. “Cristhian deserves the court’s protection as to his characterization before a jury pool.”
