An illegal alien from Cuba, released into the U.S. in 2012 from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody, and convicted of murder earlier this year after the public beheading of his girlfriend has now been found not guilty due to his mental illness.
As Breitbart News reported, Alexi Saborit-Viltres was originally arrested and charged with second-degree murder in 2021 after being accused of beheading 55-year-old America Mafalda Thayer, his girlfriend, and dumping her body on the street.
Several people witnessed the gruesome broad-daylight attack in Shakopee, Minnesota.
One of the bystanders saw him pull Thayer out of the car and then picked her head up by her hair before decapitating her.
When officers later took Saborit-Viltres into their custody, he said he had been in a long-term relationship with Thayer.
Saborit-Viltres reportedly told police the two were on their way to court when she said she wanted to end their relationship and allegedly admitted to murdering her with a machete because she had “gone too far” in wanting to leave him.
Fifty-five-year-old America Mafalda Thayer was beheaded in 2021 before her body was dumped on the street. (Photo via Facebook)
Now the New York Post reports the reversal for Saborit, who was found guilty of first-degree premeditated murder in May, came Monday when a judge made the ruling about his mental competency.
Judge Caroline Lennon’s ruling cited psychologists who determined the immigrant’s “mental illness prevented him from understanding his actions were morally wrong,” according to Fox 9.
After her initial ruling in which Saborit-Viltres potentially faced life in prison, his defense team filed a motion on July 12 to argue that he should be found not guilty because of his mental illness.
The order discussed his hospitalizations in 2013 for “bizarre delusions,” as well as a traumatic brain injury from a 2017 car crash, after which he began to have hallucinations, according to Fox 9.
The illegal immigrant was also hospitalized in May 2020 because he believed there was a camera in his head following the crash.
He was also diagnosed with several mental illnesses, including psychosis and delusions, Fox 9 reported, and was originally supposed to be deported a decade ago, but ICE agents were unable to obtain travel documents for him, as Breitbart News reported.
The deceased had worked at My Pillow, founded by Mike Lindell, and her friends said she changed her name to “America” after legally immigrating to the United States and becoming a naturalized American citizen.
