A 36-year-old Venezuelan illegal immigrant already facing burglary charges walked out of a Contra Costa County courtroom on pretrial release and, within 24 hours, allegedly killed a 68-year-old father outside the man's own home.
Marcos Iriarte-Valdez was charged with murder after he allegedly stabbed Todd Stewart during a residential burglary on August 6 in Contra Costa County, California. Security camera footage released by the Department of Homeland Security shows what appears to be Iriarte-Valdez exiting an SUV in a tactical vest, then wrestling Stewart over a knife outside Stewart's home in broad daylight. Stewart, 68, did not survive.
The day before, approximately August 5, judicial officer David E. Goldstein had released Iriarte-Valdez on pretrial release. Iriarte-Valdez had been arrested months earlier, in April, on two counts of residential burglary. He walked free. One day later, a man was dead.
Court records from Contra Costa County show the timeline in stark terms. Iriarte-Valdez picked up two felony residential burglary charges in April. By early August, he was back on the street under pretrial release conditions, conditions the material does not detail. The Daily Caller reported that within a single day of his release, Iriarte-Valdez allegedly committed the crime that ended Todd Stewart's life.
Iriarte-Valdez now faces a felony murder charge with three enhancements: killing during a burglary, using a knife, and committing the offense while out on conditional release. Bail sits at over $1 million. He has denied all charges.
And in a detail that should give every Contra Costa County resident pause, the same judicial officer who released Iriarte-Valdez before the stabbing, David E. Goldstein, has been assigned to preside over the murder case.
On August 11, DHS posted a statement on X alongside the security camera footage. The agency identified Iriarte-Valdez as a Venezuelan national who also holds Spanish citizenship and directed a public demand at California Governor Gavin Newsom:
"This Venezuelan illegal alien STABBED A FATHER TO DEATH in sanctuary California. @CAgovernor must NOT RELEASE this murderer from jail and turn him over to us so we can REMOVE him from our nation."
ICE has placed an immigration detainer on Iriarte-Valdez. Whether California authorities will honor that detainer remains an open question. California's longstanding sanctuary policies have repeatedly put the state at odds with federal immigration enforcement, a friction point that cases like this make impossible to ignore.
The pattern is familiar. In recent months, two illegal immigrants were charged in the murder of a Florida father and Marine veteran, both of whom had been released into the United States as minors years earlier. The common thread is a system that fails to hold illegal immigrants accountable before the worst happens.
Newsom's office, as of the Daily Caller's August 13 report, had not publicly responded to DHS's demand. That silence speaks for itself.
Contra Costa County District Attorney Diana Becton told ABC7 Eyewitness News that her office would handle the case seriously:
"pursue this case with diligence and integrity to hold Iriarte-Valdez fully accountable under the law for this devastating act of violence."
Becton's words are the right ones. But accountability after a man is dead is not the same as accountability before. Iriarte-Valdez was already in the system. He already faced two felony burglary counts. The system had him, and let him go.
The pretrial release decision raises hard questions that no one in Contra Costa County has publicly answered. What conditions, if any, were attached to the release? Did anyone flag the defendant's immigration status or flight risk? Was ICE notified before Goldstein opened the door? None of these details appear in the county's public statements or court filings referenced in reporting on the case.
Federal authorities, meanwhile, have been aggressive in pursuing illegal immigrants connected to violent crimes elsewhere. ICE recently arrested a Russian illegal immigrant tied to a fatal truck crash in Minnesota and moved to deport him, a case that underscores the gap between federal enforcement priorities and state-level resistance.
The DHS post included security camera footage that captures the confrontation. The video shows a man, identified by DHS as Iriarte-Valdez, stepping out of an SUV wearing a tactical vest. The footage then shows the same man wrestling Stewart over a knife outside Stewart's home, in daylight, in a residential neighborhood.
Todd Stewart was 68 years old. DHS described him as a father. He died outside his own front door, fighting for his life against a man who should have been in custody.
That last fact is not opinion. It is arithmetic. Iriarte-Valdez faced two felony counts. He was an illegal immigrant. He was released on pretrial conditions one day before he allegedly committed murder. Every institution that touched this case, the court, the county, the state, had a chance to keep him off the street. None of them did.
The Trump administration's immigration enforcement posture has produced results in other jurisdictions. A D.C. crime task force recently marked one year with more than 16,000 arrests, demonstrating what happens when law enforcement is empowered rather than restrained. California's sanctuary framework operates on the opposite principle, and Todd Stewart's family is living with the consequences.
Confrontations between federal officers and illegal immigrants during enforcement operations have turned dangerous in other states as well. An ICE officer in Houston fatally shot an illegal immigrant after an alleged vehicle ramming during an arrest attempt, a reminder that the costs of delayed enforcement fall on everyone, including the officers tasked with cleaning up the mess.
Several questions remain unanswered. Has Newsom's office communicated with DHS about the detainer? Will Contra Costa County honor it, or will state sanctuary policy override federal enforcement? Has Iriarte-Valdez retained legal counsel? And will anyone in the county's judicial system explain why a man facing two felony burglary charges was released on pretrial conditions with so little apparent scrutiny?
Iriarte-Valdez sits in custody on over $1 million bail. He has denied all charges. The murder case will proceed before the same judicial officer who set him free.
Todd Stewart is not here to offer his view of how pretrial release worked out. The people who made the decisions that put his killer on his doorstep owe his family, and every taxpayer in Contra Costa County, a straight answer.
