An illegal immigrant was found guilty of groping multiple female peers at a Virginia high school.
Israel Christopher Flores-Ortiz, 18, of El Salvador, was accused by roughly a dozen girls of putting his hands between their legs, touching their private areas, and groping them in school hallways, according to 7News.
A Fairfax County judge on Thursday found Flores-Ortiz guilty of nine counts of assault, the outlet reported. He was acquitted on three counts, while one additional charge was dismissed.
One of the victims, a ninth-grade girl, said after the verdict that the assaults have left her fearful it could happen again.
“Now I have to make sure and look around extra to see who’s around me and make sure that nobody touches me that way again,” she told 7News.
🚨 WATCH: a 9th grade girl tells me she feels she has to look over her shoulder now after being groped TWICE by a soon to be 19-year-old junior at Fairfax High School.
Israel Flores Ortiz was convicted on 9 charges of assault after more than a dozen girls reported he touched… https://t.co/MJ1ETAAv8n pic.twitter.com/tm5Bv4rvwq
— Nick Minock (@NickMinock) April 10, 2026
In an earlier interview, one victim’s mothers said 12 girls ultimately came forward.
“It was all perpetrated by a single individual who is a stranger to the girls,” she told 7News at the time. “He just sneakily walked up behind them and put his hand in between their legs. It was not just a butt smack or a butt grab. It was a groping of a private area. It had been occurring for several months.”
Flores-Ortiz, who is a junior at Fairfax High School, unlawfully crossed the border in 2024 and was subsequently released into the United States, according to the Department of Homeland Security. At the time, the Biden administration was releasing illegal immigrants en masse.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) lodged a detainer requesting that local authorities transfer him for possible deportation. The Fairfax County Sheriff’s Office recently told The Daily Wire it does not “obstruct or prevent ICE from acting on their civil detainers,” but didn’t say whether it would honor the request in Flores-Ortiz’s case.
“While it is still too early in the process to know the outcome of his case, ICE has been notified of Ortiz’s location at the ADC [Adult Detention Center], and they are able to execute their detainer by responding to the ADC and taking Ortiz into custody if and when he is ordered released,” the sheriff’s office said.
The Trump administration has also launched an investigation into the school district, which is accused of failing to respond to the reports of the gropings and even possibly engaging in a cover-up of the crimes, according to 7News.
The school did not inform parents until two weeks after the incidents were reported, the outlet said. Some parents also said they were told the school system would allow the illegal immigrant to return to school after his release.
“They have attempted to sweep it under the rug,” one mother previously told 7News.
“They sent out a letter last night,” the mother said, adding, “But it was a completely sanitized letter.”
“The girls have experienced harassment and bullying from peers at school, including people that they once thought were their friends, and the letter that they sent out, referencing it only as buttocks touching, just adds fuel to rumors that they were just attention seeking,” another mother told 7News.
Fairfax County Public Schools declined “to comment on specifics due to federal and state privacy laws,” adding “we prioritize student and staff safety and we fully investigate any time someone shares that an incident has occurred at school, or that they do not feel safe at school,” according to 7News.
“We are grateful to our law enforcement partners who continue to work swiftly and thoroughly when there are safety concerns in our schools. The safety of all FCPS students and staff remains a top priority,” the school system said.
