NOVEMBER 20, 2024:
FERGUS FALLS, Minn. (AP) — A man convicted of human smuggling testified that he shuttled more than 500 Indian migrants across the U.S.-Canada border over four years. Rajinder Singh said Tuesday (Nov. 19, 2024) that he made over $400,000 while working in the same international smuggling ring as two men who are on trial in federal court in Minnesota. The defendants in the trial are Harshkumar Ramanlal Patel and Steve Shand. Federal prosecutors say they attempted to smuggle migrants across the border in 2022. A couple from India and their two young children froze to death. The defense attorney for one man says his client shouldn’t have been charged; an attorney for the other says her client was tricked.
NOVEMBER 19, 2024:
FERGUS FALLS, Minn. (AP) — An Indian migrant who survived a deadly trek across the Canada-U.S. border in blizzard conditions is expected to testify in the federal trial of two men accused of human smuggling. Federal prosecutors say the men put financial profit over human life when they attempted to smuggle migrants across the border in 2022. A couple from India and their two young children froze to death. Prosecutors say the men were part of an international criminal network that smuggled families seeking better lives in the United States. The defense attorney for one man says his client should not have been charged; an attorney for the other says her client was tricked.
NOVEMBER 18, 2024:
FERGUS FALLS, Minn. (AP) — A criminal network stretching from India to Canada made money smuggling families seeking better lives in the United States, including a man who died holding his 3-year-old son in gusting snow and bone-chilling temperatures two years ago, federal prosecutors plan to argue at a trial starting Monday (Nov. 18, 2024) in Minnesota.
Prosecutors have accused Indian national Harshkumar Ramanlal Patel, 29, of running the scheme and Steve Shand, 50, of Florida of waiting in a truck for 11 migrants, including the couple and two children who died after they tried to walk across the border to the U.S.
Prosecutors say Patel recruited Shand at a casino near their homes in Deltona, Florida, just north of Orlando.
Jagdish Patel, 39, died along with his wife, Vaishaliben, who was in her mid-30s, and with their 11-year-old daughter, Vihangi and their 3-year-old son Dharmik. Patel is a common Indian surname and the victims were not related to Harshkumar Patel, who has pleaded not guilty, as has Shand.
The family, from the village of Dingucha in Gujarat state, is believed to have spent hours wandering fields in blizzard conditions as the wind chill reached minus 36 Fahrenheit (minus 38 Celsius). Canadian authorities found the Patels’ frozen bodies on the morning of Jan. 19, 2022. Jagdish Patel was holding Dharmik, who was wrapped in a blanket.
Federal prosecutors say Patel and Shand were part of an operation that scouted clients in India, got them Canadian student visas, arranged transportation and smuggled them into the U.S., mostly through Washington state or Minnesota.
The U.S. Border Patrol arrested more than 14,000 Indians on the Canadian border in the year ending Sept. 30. By 2022, the Pew Research Center estimates there were more than 725,000 Indians living illegally in the U.S., behind only Mexicans and El Salvadorans.
Harshkumar Patel’s attorney, Thomas Leinenweber, told The Associated Press that his client came to America to escape poverty and build a better life for himself and now “stands unjustly accused of participating in this horrible crime. He has faith in the justice system of his adopted country and believes that the truth will come out at the trial.” Attorneys for Shand did not return messages.
Court documents filed by prosecutors show Patel was in the U.S. illegally after being refused a U.S. visa at least five times.
Over a five-week period, court documents say, Patel and Shand often communicated about the bitter cold as they smuggled five groups of Indians over a quiet stretch of border. One night in December 2021, Shand messaged Patel that it was “cold as hell” while waiting to pick up one group, the documents say.
“They going to be alive when they get here?” he allegedly wrote.
During the last trip in January, Shand had messaged Patel, saying: “Make sure everyone is dressed for the blizzard conditions, please,” according to prosecutors.
Prosecutors say Shand told investigators that Patel paid him about $25,000 for the five trips.
Jagdish Patel grew up in Dingucha. He and family lived with his parents. The couple were schoolteachers, according to local news reports.
Satveer Chaudhary is a Minneapolis-based immigration attorney who has helped migrants exploited by motel owners, many of them Gujaratis. He said smugglers and shady business interests promised many migrants an American dream that doesn’t exist when they arrive.
“The promises of the almighty dollar lead many people to take unwarranted risks with their own dignity, and as we’re finding out here, their own lives,” Chaudary said.
MARCH 27, 2024:
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A man accused of helping smuggle people across the U.S.-Canadian border had been warned of blizzard conditions before he arranged for four members of an Indian family to cross in 2022, prosecutors allege. The parents and two young children froze to death.
Harshkumar Ramanlal Patel, 28, who prosecutors say went by the alias “Dirty Harry,” is due in federal court in Minnesota on Wednesday (March 27, 2024) on seven counts of human smuggling. The man he allegedly hired to drive the Indian nationals from the Canadian border to the Chicago area also faces four counts, according to a new indictment unsealed last week.
The alleged driver, Steve Shand, of Deltona, Florida, was arrested and charged with human smuggling two years ago. He has pleaded not guilty and remains free on his own recognizance. Proceedings in his case have been put on hold several times.
In a recent court document, an agent with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said Patel has been refused a U.S. visa at least five times, including four at U.S. consulates in India and once at the U.S. consulate in Ottawa, Canada. He is in the U.S. illegally, the agent said.
Patel’s name didn’t emerge until he was arrested in Chicago last month on a previously sealed warrant issued last September. Defense attorney Thomas Leinenweber said in an email that Patel will plead not guilty on Wednesday. He didn’t elaborate.
Unsealed court papers connect Patel with a human trafficking group based in the northwest Indian state of Gujarat. The group allegedly would get Indian nationals into Canada on student visas, then move them on to the Chicago area.
The migrants would work for substandard wages at Indian restaurants while they paid off debt to the smugglers, according to the court documents.
Prosecutors allege Shand was driving a rented 15-passenger van when it was stopped by the U.S. Border Patrol in Minnesota just south of the Canadian border on Jan. 19, 2022. Inside the van were two Indians from Gujarat who had entered the U.S. illegally, while five others were spotted walking nearby. According to court documents, they told officers they’d been walking for more than 11 hours in temperatures well below zero Fahrenheit (-34 Celsius).
One person was hospitalized with severe cold-related injuries.
A man with the group told authorities he paid the equivalent of about $87,000 to get smuggled into the U.S. He also had a backpack that contained children’s clothes and a diaper, but there were no children in the group.
The man told authorities he was carrying the items for a family of four with a small child, all of whom had become separated from his group during the night. Later that day, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police found the four dead, just 10 meters (33 feet) from the border near Emerson, Manitoba.
According to a series of messages sent via WhatsApp, Shand told Patel, “Make sure everyone is dressed for the blizzard conditions please.” Patel replied, “Done.” Then Shand remarked, “We not losing any money.”
The victims were identified as Jagdish Patel, 39; his wife, Vaishaliben, 34; their 11-year-old daughter, Vihangi; and 3-year-old son Dharmik, all from the village of Dingucha in Gujarat state. It’s not clear if they were related to the defendant because Patel is a common name in India.
Jagdish Patel and his wife were educated and had worked as teachers, but sought a better life in the U.S, relatives have said.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has said their deaths were “mind blowing.”
The victims faced not only bitter cold, but also flat, open fields; large snowdrifts and complete darkness, the Mounted Police have said. They were wearing winter clothing, but it wasn’t enough to save them.
A court filing unsealed last month said Shand told investigators he first met Harshkumar Patel, whom he also knew by the nickname “Dirty Harry,” at a gaming establishment Patel managed in Orange City, Florida.
Shand said Patel originally tried to recruit him to pick up Indian nationals who were illegally crossing the U.S.-Canada border in New York. Shand said he declined, but agreed to pick up others in Minnesota.
Shand said Patel paid him about $25,000 altogether for five trips to the border in December 2021 and January 2022. He said he dropped off his passengers at an Indian supermarket in Chicago, a residence in a wealthy part of the Chicago area, and at a suburban Chicago motel.
MAY 28, 2023:
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — A Florida man charged with human smuggling related to the deaths last year of four immigrants near the Canadian border has pleaded not guilty to the federal charges. Court records show that Steve Shand entered the plea Friday (May 26, 2023) in a hearing held via video conference. Federal authorities arrested Shand in January 2022 after authorities found a family of four Indian nationals, including an infant and a teen, who had frozen to death during a blizzard just across the Canadian border. Officials also found five other Indian nationals on foot in Minnesota and two more in Shand’s van. The Deltona, Florida, man is charged with bringing two people into the country illegally and illegally transporting them once in the U.S.
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