Suspect in 5 killings was freed in deportation lapse
The man suspected of killing five people in a San Francisco home Friday was ordered to be deported six years ago, but remained in the United States when his native country of Vietnam refused to cooperate, authorities said Monday.
Binh Thai Luc, 35, of San Francisco was arrested Sunday, two days after the bodies of three women and two men were discovered in an Ingleside district home.
On Monday, officials revealed that Luc had been taken into U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody in August 2006 after he completed an eight-year prison sentence for assault and attempted robbery. Authorities say he was ordered removed from the country by an immigration judge a month later. Vietnamese authorities declined to provide appropriate travel documents, however, and Luc could not be repatriated. Luc was then released in December 2006.
The agency cited Supreme Court rulings and precedent in justifying its release of Luc. In a statement, ICE said that continued detention of an immigrant becomes unlawful after six months, when “no significant likelihood of removal exists in the reasonably foreseeable future.”
“There are a number of countries where we encounter problems obtaining travel documents, and Vietnam is one of them,” agency spokeswoman Virginia Kice said. “This is not unusual.”
Kice added that Luc was on a reporting schedule to the ICE office in San Francisco as required after his release from custody. She said he was complying with requirements and had no other incidents or arrests.
On Monday, the San Francisco medical examiner identified the victims: Hua Shun Lei, 65; Vincent Lei, 32; Ying Xue Lei, 37; Wan Yi Xu, 62; and Chia Huei Chu, 30, all of San Francisco. Medical Examiner Deputy Director William Ahern said it was not yet clear if any of them were related.
Initially, police thought the killings might have been a murder-suicide and that at least some of the victims had been shot. Authorities later determined that all the victims died of blunt-force trauma. Police Chief Greg Suhr told the media Sunday that the killer used “an edged weapon ... that can cut someone.”
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