Brazilian illegal immigrant Flavio Alcantara Dias allegedly strangled Brianna Connolly inside her Framingham, Massachusetts, home, then asked 911 to send police because he had killed her “by mistake.”
Dias, 43, was still outside the home when officers got there last Thursday, Middlesex County Assistant District Attorney Thomas Brandt said.
“Can I have police? A homicide just happened here right now,” Dias allegedly told the dispatcher.
He waited there for police to arrive. Brandt said Dias also admitted he had strangled Connolly after going “crazy” and suffocating her.
“I ended up killing a woman by mistake,” Dias allegedly told the dispatcher, Brandt recalled.
Connolly, 33, was declared dead inside the house. The details police encountered there, Brandt said, supported the caller’s own description.
“The police then make observations, and the observations that the police make at that point are entirely consistent with the account and description that the defendant has given,” Brandt said.
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Those observations included blood marks on Connolly’s forehead and the back of her head. Brandt said police also saw a small fabric cord around her neck.
Boston 25 reported that Dias claimed he woke from sleep and found Connolly no longer breathing. Before that alleged discovery, he said they had been using drugs at her home and fought after he wanted sex and she did not.
He is being held without bail on charges of assault and battery causing serious bodily harm and possession of ammunition without a firearm identification card.
Fox News said Dias entered the country illegally in 2019 and had prior arrests for DUI and aggravated assault before an immigration judge granted his request to end deportation proceedings in 2024 under the Biden administration.
Any release from local custody would trigger an ICE request for Dias to be transferred to federal immigration officials. DHS urged Framingham police to participate, citing ICE cooperation in seven of the country’s 10 safest cities.
“The safest way to arrest and remove criminal illegal aliens from our streets is by lodging arrest detainers. Seven of the top 10 safest cities in the United States cooperate with ICE,” the department said.
“Our message is clear: if you come into our country illegally and break our laws, we will find you, we will arrest you, and we will deport you,” the department said.
The Middlesex County Sheriff’s Office reported on Thursday that they had received an ICE detainer for Dias. They told Boston 25 News on Tuesday that Dias was being held until his charges are settled.
“It is the responsibility of the Middlesex Sheriff’s Office to hold those remanded to us by the courts on state criminal charges pending the conclusion of their state case or their court-ordered release,” a spokesperson told the outlet.
In Mulberry, Florida, a 77-year-old woman’s description sent detectives to a nearby home, where they found 24-year-old Honduran national Axel Antonio Espinal Herrera taking a shower.
The woman later picked Herrera out of a photo lineup. The Polk County Sheriff’s Office said scratches on his body matched her account of fighting back, while cocaine was also found in his possession. Herrera initially spoke to detectives before declining to answer more questions.
By the time Herrera went into the bathroom, the woman had allegedly been sexually assaulted in her bedroom and slapped during an earlier bid to get away. She ran for the front door naked, but Herrera allegedly caught her, dragged her into the house and choked her before fleeing.
The encounter began after a noise woke the victim around 4 a.m. Saturday. The sheriff’s office said Herrera entered her bedroom, forced off her clothes and sexually assaulted her.
His booking included charges of kidnapping, sexual battery by force, burglary with battery, tampering with evidence, possession of cocaine, possession of drug paraphernalia and loitering/prowling.
Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said Herrera’s immigration status raised the stakes of an already violent attack on a stranger.
“And then you take on top of that that the suspect is in this country illegally that pushes it over the top,” Judd said.
“Sexual battery of an individual is without a doubt one of the most horrific crimes that occurs. And a violent, out-of-control sexual battery on a stranger even elevates that one more level,” Judd said.
ICE asked the local jail to turn Herrera over if he is released. The agency also placed detainers on two Honduran men who lived with him after their illegal status led to their arrests.
In New Jersey, a mother and her two children arrived at Jersey Shore University Medical Center in Neptune after they were hit outside a kosher grocery store in Jackson.
The mother and her 5-year-old child were stable, but her 9-month-old son died at the hospital.
Authorities accused Guatemalan national Maria Cobon-Guzman of striking the mother and the baby carriage holding both children in the parking lot. She faces a manslaughter charge.
UPDATE: DHS has confirmed with Border Hawk that both suspects arrested following a collision in a New Jersey parking lot that killed an infant and injured his mother and sister are ILLEGAL ALIENS who crossed Biden's open border.
Maria Jose Cobon-Guzman, a Guatemalan national,… https://t.co/9BwatyCB6p pic.twitter.com/f7zWYfLZmf
— Border Hawk (@BorderHawkNews) August 31, 2026
Ariadna Lazaro-Flores was charged after allegedly handing Cobon-Guzman the keys even though she knew Cobon-Guzman had no license. An inmate report identifies Lazaro-Flores’ charge as “endangering the welfare of an incompetent person.”
DHS said Cobon-Guzman entered the United States illegally once, then was released into the country without vetting. An immigration judge ordered her removal on July 31.
Lazaro-Flores entered illegally five times in October 2023 and was removed each time, the department said.
“An innocent baby would still be alive today had it not been for Joe Biden’s disastrous open border and reckless immigration policy that released countless illegal aliens into our country,” a DHS spokesperson told Fox News.
