Illinois Trial Looms for Migrant Who Attempted Self-Deportation to Conceal Death

A migrant’s attempt to return to Mexico from Illinois has taken an unexpected turn, as he now faces charges in a northern suburb of Chicago. The charges relate to the concealment of a 37-year-old woman’s death.

The case of Jose Mendoza-Gonzalez captured public interest when police in Waukegan, Illinois, discovered the body of Megan Bos in a container on his property. Bos had been missing for several weeks, and authorities suspect she might have died from a fentanyl overdose at Mendoza-Gonzalez’s home. Federal officials report that Mendoza-Gonzalez is in the U.S. illegally and allege that he attempted to hide her death and impede the investigation. He is also facing charges of corpse abuse.

Under Illinois’s recently implemented “SAFE-T Act,” which eliminates cash bail, a judge initially released the 52-year-old pending trial. This decision left Megan Bos’s mother, Jennifer Bos, in shock.

“I was astonished,” Jennifer Bos expressed, “I couldn’t believe they would allow someone who kept a body in his yard and destroyed all the evidence to walk free less than 24 hours later,” she shared with Mills Hayes.

Over the summer, Jennifer Bos was in Washington for a Trump administration event about the dangers of fentanyl when she was able to catch the president’s attention.

“In about 30 seconds I said, ‘This man did this to my daughter and he’s walking free because of the SAFE-T Act,’” she said.

Trump told her, “Watch what happens.”

Three days later, Mendoza-Gonzalez was picked up by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. But that raised the question about whether he would be deported and evade charges in the U.S.

Jose Mendoza-Gonzales ordered held in Lake County, Illinois

At a detention hearing in Lake County last week, Jennifer Bos said, a judge ruled Mendoza-Gonzalez was a flight risk, based on recent requests he made to be allowed to return to Mexico. ICE transferred custody to local authorities, and now he’ll sit in jail until his trial in January the result that Jennifer Bos had hoped for.

She said the case demonstrates why the SAFE-T Act needs reassessing. Illinois lawmakers abolished cash bail with the idea that it adversely affects poor people who don’t pose a public safety risk. Under the new law, judges can still order potentially dangerous people held before trial.

“There are good aspects of the SAFE-T Act itself, and I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask … for it to be reviewed and pulled back and changed, so that it does benefit victims as much as it benefits the criminals,” Jennifer Bos said.

Megan Bos’s death is still under investigation.

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