An illegal migrant allegedly high on a powerful drug bit a toddler’s face in Texas last week, two years after the Biden administration failed to kick him out of the US despite his arrest in an earlier violent assault, authorities told The New York Post.
The horrific April 18 attack in a San Antonio park left three-year-old Amelia Perez with deep scratches and bite wounds across her face, two teeth knocked out, and life-changing trauma, her family said.
“That brute was ravaging my baby,” her mother, Gabriella Perez, 27, told The Post.
“She’s terrified to sleep. She’s lashing out, angry. She doesn’t understand evil like this f***ing man. She’ll never be the same again.”
That Saturday, the family – Ms Perez, Amelia, her father Xavier Estrada, 27, and grandfather Richard Ariaza – headed from their home in LaCoste to Espada Park for a quiet afternoon of fishing for bass, catfish and sunfish.
At around 2pm, Ms Perez took Amelia to the bathroom, and when they stepped back outside, a man in a frenzied state charged toward them, she said.
The man, identified by police as Atharva Vyas, a 24-year-old illegal migrant from India, lunged, grabbed Ms Perez’s hair and punched her in the jaw.
Ms Perez quickly lowered her daughter to the ground to remove her from the fray, but Vyas leapt on the three-year-old, she said.
Vyas was allegedly under the influence of “wax”, a highly concentrated cannabis product – with one dose akin to smoking 10 to 20 joints, authorities said.
On all fours, he pinned Amelia to the ground, jamming his thumbs into her eyes before biting her face and mouth.
Vyas allegedly ripped out Amelia’s two front teeth as Ms Perez fought, clawing and wrenching at him in a desperate attempt to save her daughter, she said.
Horrified witnesses surged forward, dragging Vyas off Amelia while Ms Perez screamed for her husband – until he finally heard the commotion and raced to the scene.
Someone called police, while two men pulled out guns.
“I was screaming, ‘Shoot him! Shoot him’,” Ms Perez said.
The crowd finally overwhelmed Vyas, beating him until he collapsed, she said.
He attempted to get up, but each time the crowd subdued him again until San Antonio police officers arrived to find him drifting in and out of consciousness.
Emergency services took Amelia and her family to Christus Children’s Hospital.
“In the emergency room, the adults were all going crazy while Amelia was suffering shock,” Ms Perez said.
“She sat eerie calm, like a statue, while the nurses and doctors worked on her poor face. She didn’t make a peep, even though she was in a great deal of pain. It hadn’t hit her yet, what happened.”
Vyas was jailed in the Bexar County Detention Centre and charged with injury to a child with intent to cause bodily injury, assault causing bodily injury and illegal entry from a foreign nation, according to court records.
The Department of Homeland Security told The Post Vyas first entered the country from India in August 2023 on a student visa.
Three months later, he was arrested on the University of Texas campus for felony assault.
The college contacted ICE, but the feds under then-President Joe Biden determined the crime was not “egregious” enough to warrant visa revocation.
But in April 2025, the Trump administration revoked Vyas’ F-1 visa based on the assault arrest.
The day Vyas allegedly attacked Amelia, ICE lodged a detainer request with San Antonio police – asking the local cops to turn him over after he faces the American justice system.
The agency has criticised the failed policies that allowed Vyas to remain in the US.
“This barbaric assault against this woman and her 3-year-old child in a park was completely preventable,” Acting Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis wrote on social media.
“The Biden administration NEVER should have released this animal following his arrest for assault.”
In a GoFundMe, Ms Perez said the emotional distress from the attack has been overwhelming.
“We need people to send us prayers,” Ms Perez said.
“We are focusing on healing and recovery. Even though you try to protect your children, this is a dangerous world with dangerous people.”
A DHS spokesperson said “law enforcement is protecting American communities every day from another senseless tragedy like this taking place in another town, to another family”.
This article was originally published by The New York Post and was reproduced with permission
