Famed Boxer Deported, Lands in Mexico Prison

Former world champion boxer Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. has been deported from the US. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum confirmed Tuesday that the 39-year-old professional boxer was returned to Mexico following his ICE arrest last month. The Department of Homeland Security claimed he was living in the US illegally after overstaying a visa and had an active arrest warrant in his home country. "I understand he was deported ... I don't know if it was yesterday or this morning, but we were informed that he was arriving in Mexico," Sheinbaum said in Spanish, per the Washington Post. Chavez was then arrested in the border city of Nogales and taken to prison, per the BBC.

DHS accused Chavez of making fraudulent statements on a 2024 application for permanent resident status, based on his marriage to an American citizen with alleged connections to the Sinaloa cartel. It noted a 2023 warrant out of Mexico accused Chavez of "involvement in organized crime and trafficking firearms, ammunition, and explosives," per the Post. Mexican prosecutors accuse Chavez of acting as a henchman for the cartel, though his family denies any cartel connection, per the BBC. In January 2024, Chavez was charged with illegal possession of an assault rifle in Los Angeles. The son of world champion boxer Julio Cesar Chavez also has a 2012 DUI conviction.