The Arizona prosecutor who is refusing to send an accused prostitute killer to New York said she is looking out for the families of his victims and cannot guarantee the suspect will remain locked up because of Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s lax bail policy.
Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell has ordered her staff not to extradite Raad Noan Almansoori, 26, to New York, where he is wanted for the alleged murder of sex worker Denisse Oleas-Arancibia, 38.
He was arrested in Arizona after police said he stabbed two women: one in a McDonalds and the other while stealing her car.
‘We are dealing with two very violent crimes here. We have two women who have been stabbed and he faces a long mandatory prison sentence here and even though there is a murder in New York, we can guarantee he will remain in custody,” Mitchell said. FOX & Friends.
“I will put the victims first and ensure he remains in custody,” she said. “I don’t want this person to get out and victimize even more people.”
Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell told FOX & Friends she is looking out for the victims’ families by not extraditing accused murderer Raad Noan Almansoori, 26, to New York
Bragg held a news conference Thursday in which he claimed Mitchell refused to extradite as a political tool
Raad Almansoori, 26, was arrested by police in Arizona for a separate attack on another woman and is wanted in New York for the alleged murder of sex worker Denisse Oleas-Arancibia, 38
She cited Bragg’s “treatment of violent criminals” as the reason for her decision not to extradite Almansoori.
“And again, this doesn’t cast aspersions on the NYPD, but it was just a few weeks ago that some illegal immigrants who were in New York City beating up police officers were released,” Mitchell said.
“They turned the camera off as they walked out of the jail, and guess where they ended up? Four of them ended up in Maricopa County and had to be taken into custody here.”
Almansoori is in custody on suspicion of murdering Queens sex worker Oleas-Arancibia by strangling her and hitting her in the head at the Soho 54 hotel on February 8.
Surveillance footage of Almansoori, caught after Oleas-Arancibia’s murder, shows him wearing her bodysuit on a well-lit Manhattan street.
Almansoori was on bail at the time of the murder for attacking and sexually assaulting another escort in Florida in April 2023. After being arrested on that charge, he later posted his own bail in September last year.
While out on bail, he allegedly murdered Oleas-Arancibia before fleeing across the country.
“After seeing the treatment of violent criminals in the New York area by the Manhattan District Attorney there, Alvin Bragg, I think it is safer to keep him here and keep him in custody so he can do this too.” cannot do to individuals in our state. County or anywhere in the United States, Mitchell said, according to NBC News.
“This is not the intention of the New York Police Department at all. “I know they have done hard work, they have done well, but we will not agree to extradition,” she added.
‘I have instructed my extradition lawyers not to agree to that. We’ll keep him here.’
Bragg held a news conference Thursday in which he claimed Mitchell refused to extradite as a political tool.
‘Her reasoning? Not because that’s what the law dictates, not because that’s what promotes justice, not out of concern for the victims, not at the request of the NYPD – but rather plain, old-fashioned grandstanding and politics,” Bragg said.
Mitchell (pictured) told reporters she has instructed her staff not to participate in plans to return Almansoori to New York
Mitchell responded to Bragg’s statement about her decision to extradite, saying, “It’s great to see the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office finally taking an interest in violent crimes.”
Bragg refuted her claim that the migrants arrested in Arizona were involved in the attack on police in Times Square
“It is deeply disturbing to me that a member of my profession, a member of law enforcement, would choose to play politics in a murder case.”
He also refuted her claim that migrants arrested in Arizona were involved in a separate, high-profile attack on police in Times Square.
“This has been demonstrably proven to be untrue for weeks, so repeating a baseless untruth, now on national television, makes no sense,” Bragg said.
“That’s what the NYPD said. My office has said it publicly. Different names, different dates of birth, different fingerprints. Different people. My office has charged seven people in the despicable and heinous attack on two of New York’s Finest.”
Emily Tuttle, a representative for Bragg, said it is “deeply disturbing” that Mitchell is “playing political games in a murder investigation” and described her statement as “a slap in the face” to law enforcement in New York.
“In Manhattan, we take the safety of New Yorkers seriously, which is why homicides have dropped by 24 percent and shootings by 38 percent since DA Bragg took office,” Tuttle said in a statement.
“New York’s homicide rate is less than half that of Phoenix, Arizona, thanks to the hard work of the NYPD and all of our law enforcement partners.
“It is a slap in the face to them and to the victim in our case to refuse to allow us to seek justice and full accountability for the death of a New Yorker.”
In a scathing response to Bragg’s office at X, Mitchell hit back. “It’s great to see the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office finally taking an interest in violent crime. My job is to focus on the victims I have to protect.”
NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny said Almansoori purchased a plane ticket from Florida to New York on Jan. 26.
When staff discovered Denisse Oleas-Arancibia’s body on the morning of February 8, the 38-year-old was lying under a blanket and next to a broken iron, having checked in the day before.
A surveillance footage image shows the suspect in Oleas-Arancibia’s gruesome murder wearing a bodysuit in Manhattan
Oleas-Arancibia’s death has been formally ruled a homicide (photo: interior of the room where Oleas-Arancibia was found)
According to Kenny, he has credit card use in the Big Apple three days later and visits an escort in Upper Manhattan on February 6.
Oleas-Arancibia’s body was found on the morning of February 8, and four days later Almansoori was said to have flown back to Arizona from Newark.
Officials in Arizona took him into custody Sunday after he stabbed a woman at McDonald’s after dragging her into the ladies’ room and holding her against her will.
Police say Almansoori was arrested shortly after he tried to flee in a stolen car and admitted to a previous stabbing in Phoenix while in custody. In that incident, a woman was stabbed when a man with a knife tried to steal her car.
Almansoori was booked into the Maricopa County Jail on charges of attempted murder, aggravated assault and robbery.
He was also charged with theft, assault, theft and criminal damage in the separate Phoenix investigation. He is being held without bond.