MIAMI -- Reynaldo Rapalo, suspect in the serial rapes that terrorized the Shenandoah area for the past year, was apparently intent on staying in the United States, even if it meant he would be here illegally.

He arrived at Miami International Airport from Honduras on Jan. 14, 2000, on a crewmember transit visa good for just 29 days.

That is usually the visa used by foreign crew members who will be working on commercial ships.

But just 12 days later, Rapalo filed an application for a Florida state identification card. Channel 10 got a hold of that application, and Problem Solver Rad Berky took a close look at it.

Rapalo used his Honduran passport and the still-valid visa to get the ID card.

Four months later, Rapalo filed another application with the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles for a driver's license, using that Florida ID card, but also noted on the form is that he presented a U.S. DD-214 form. That is a form stating that he had been discharged from the United States military.

The state says that discharge form was obviously bogus, and they say that since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, all such forms are now scanned and cross-checked to make sure they are not phonies.

Two years passed, and in July 2002, Rapalo was arrested and charged with aggravated assault of his girlfriend. The charge was eventually dropped.

He was arrested again in October 2002, charged that time with lewd and lascivious behavior on a child, but that charge was also dropped.

Even though Rapalo was held at the Dade County jail during those arrests, no one picked up on the fact that he had been in this country illegally for two years.

Janelle Hall, from the Department of Corrections, told Problem Solver Rad Berky, "We are in the corrections business -- we don't forward names routinely to immigration. That's not our responsibility."

But a spokesperson for Immigration and Customs Enforcement told Berky that an automated inquiry was made by the jail after one of those two arrests, and ICE told the jail the date of Rapalo's entry into the country and that he had not departed on the date he was supposed to.

ICE spokesperson Barbara Gonzalez said immigration did not pursue Rapalo because at that time "we focused on criminals and absconders. He did not fall into either category" because he was not convicted of either crime.

ICE officials also say things have changed since Sept. 11, 2001, and what happened with Rapalo would not happen again. They say now the bureau would focus on anyone it was alerted to who was in the country illegally.

The Department of Motor Vehicles also says that anyone with a visa who applies for a Florida drivers license can now only get a license for the length of time their visa allows them to remain in the country.

That was not the case when Rapalo got his license that is good until 2006.