With its top prosecutor and sheriff already set to testify before a House subcommittee on immigration policies this month, Virginia’s largest county is again facing Republican scrutiny over its handling of crimes allegedly committed by people in the country illegally, this time at a local high school.
Earlier this week, the U.S. Department of Education launched an investigation into the Fairfax County Public Schools system, following the arrest of an 18-year-old male student from El Salvador who allegedly groped several female classmates on a single day.
“Virginia’s experiment with radical gender ideology, race-based admissions systems, far-Left indoctrination, and unlawful discrimination has inflicted immeasurable harm on our students,” the Education Department wrote in a post on X announcing the investigation under the Title IX federal law that prohibits sexual harassment, assaults and other gender-related crimes in schools and other facilities that receive federal assistance. “It must stop.”
The probe is the latest from the Trump administration targeting the Fairfax schools system and other Northern Virginia districts, which have previously faced federal inquiries over allegations a staff member helped two students schedule abortions and into policies protecting transgender students and diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.
In the new investigation, the alleged series of incidents occurred at a school in the city of Fairfax, whose local high school is part of the Fairfax County Schools system.
Fairfax City police officials said they were notified on March 5 of multiple alleged assaults that occurred on the grounds of Fairfax High School about a week earlier. The department investigated and learned “an adult male student assaulted numerous female juvenile victims,” according to a news release.
Israel Flores Ortiz, a junior at the school, turned himself in the next day, according to documents filed in Fairfax County Circuit Court. He was initially charged with nine counts of assault and battery for offenses that occurred on Feb. 25.
Flores Ortiz allegedly “grabbed other students on their buttocks and/or between their legs, all on the same day,” his public defender, Jamie Hospers, said in a court filing.
Within weeks of his arrest, more victims came forward, and Flores Ortiz was charged with an additional four counts of assault and battery. At least two of those counts, according to online court records, stem from instances that happened between Feb. 25 and his arrest date.
“Fairfax High School apparently did not remove Mr. Flores Ortiz during that intervening period,” Hospers said in the court filing. He declined to comment for this story.
In a statement Tuesday, Fairfax County Public Schools said it is “prepared to fully cooperate” with the Education Department inquiry. The district also said Fairfax Superintendent Michelle Reid has hired McGuireWoods, an outside law firm, to conduct an independent review of the allegations.
“The goal is clear: to establish a definitive understanding of what occurred, when it occurred, and confirm that all policies, procedures, and regulations were properly followed,” Fairfax Schools said.
The allegations brought an even brighter spotlight from conservatives on the deep blue county of more than 1.1 million residents, an increasing number of whom are immigrants from Latin America, South Asia and Asia.
In 2021, the county’s Board of Supervisors adopted a “Trust Policy,” which prohibits county employees from sharing information with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, unless ordered to do so by a judge. A few years earlier, the office of county sheriff Stacey Ann Kincaid (D) stopped honoring requests by ICE to hold inmates wanted for deportation past their release date unless the request is accompanied by a court order.
Those policies, plus a decision by county prosecutor Steve Descano (D) to pull back on prosecuting certain low-level crimes because of a lack of resources, have drawn ire in conservative circles.
In February, conservative Republicans homed in on the case of an undocumented migrant from Sierra Leone who was accused of fatally stabbing a woman at a bus stop. Abdul Jalloh had been arrested over 40 times since 2017, including for assault and battery, malicious wounding and rape. Jalloh, 32, was freed from state custody for some of his prior offenses because of a lack of evidence, according to court records.
He now faces second-degree murder and is being held without bond.
Far-right critics, including House Republicans, say Fairfax County policies make it difficult for federal immigration agents to deport people in the country illegally who are accused or convicted of a crime.
Descano and Kincaid have been asked to testify about the county’s policies at a House Judiciary subcommittee on immigration integrity, security and enforcement hearing scheduled for April 15.
In the Fairfax High School case, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said Flores Ortiz unlawfully entered the United States from El Salvador in 2024.
He remains in jail, after a judge denied him bail on March 13. DHS did not respond to questions about whether Flores Ortiz is targeted for deportation upon his release.
Demetry Pikrallidas, a Virginia attorney hired to represent one of the student victims, said his client was in a crowded hallway at school when she was inappropriately touched. She reported that incident with a group of others, including a staff member, Pikrallidas said.
Pikrallidas said he is still investigating the allegations and has yet to file a lawsuit, but he believes the assaults began long before February.
“We believe that this is probably going on much longer than people realize,” he said.
A news release sent by Pikrallidas’s law firm earlier this week said he plans to interrogate “supervision in hallways and common areas, staff presence, and whether existing measures were sufficient given the size and population of the student body.”
His client’s family, Pikrallidas said, feels “minimized” by the school’s communication about the incidents, in particular a March 12 email from Fairfax High School Principal Georgina Aye that described the alleged crime as “touching students’ buttocks while they were transitioning in the hallways.”
They hope “this never happens again to another student in any school anywhere in the country, let alone Fairfax High School,” he said, adding that the school district should be transparent about the findings from the McGuireWoods review and explore schooling options that keep adult students in settings away from minors.
“This is not a rush to a courthouse, and we’re not going to rush to judgment, but there’s a real problem in Fairfax High School,” Pikrallidas said. “There’s a real problem in Fairfax County Public Schools.”
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