A Dallas federal court sentenced a five-time deported criminal alien to a 10-year prison term for illegally re-entering the United States after removal. The sentence is the maximum allowed under the federal sentencing guidelines.

Senior U.S. District Court Judge John H. McBryde handed down a prison sentence of ten years to Antonio Serrano-Perez, a 39-year-old Mexican national from Tamaulipas, on October 18. The sentence is the statutory maximum based upon the criminal alien’s immigration and criminal history, according to information obtained from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials (ICE).

Serrano-Perez’s record includes five deportations from the United States over a 20-year period, officials stated. Immigration officers removed him for the first time in October 1998. He illegally re-entered the U.S. in 2005 at the age of 25. After being arrested for an immigration violation, a federal judge in the Southern District of Texas sentenced him t a 27-month prison sentence. Immigration officers removed him most recently in 2014, officials stated.

Prosecutors testified that Serrano-Perez illegally re-entered the U.S sometime after the 2014 removal and moved to Fort Worth. Immigration officers tracked him down and arrested him outside his residence on March 11, 2019.

The judge noted that during Serrano-Perez’s time in the U.S., he racked up a series of state drug and violent crime convictions. He also received three federal immigration convictions. Some of his crimes include cocaine trafficking and family violence, the judge noted during the sentencing phase.

“This felon and narcotics trafficker has been deported to Mexico five times and has repeatedly demonstrated that he has no respect for U.S. laws,” ICE Dallas Field Office Director Marc J. Moore said in a written statement. “Throughout his extensive criminal career, he has operated as though the United States is simply a profitable location for him to traffic in illegal drugs. After he fully completes his latest federal prison sentence for illegally re-entering the United States, our ICE officers will deport him a sixth time.”

Assistant U.S. Attorney Levi Thomas led the prosecution for the Northern District of Texas following ann investigation and arrest by officers and agents assigned to ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations and Homeland Security Investigations.