Manitoba [Canada], March 23 (HBTV): Two men have been indicted by US federal prosecutors in connection with the death of an Indian migrant family more than two years ago along the US-Canada border in Manitoba, CBC News reported.
Steve Shand from Deltona, Florida, found himself named in a superseding indictment filed in US District Court, District of Minnesota, alongside Harshkumar Ramanlal Patel, an Indian citizen residing in Florida, court documents revealed.
The saga unfolded when US border patrol agents apprehended Shand and two migrants in a rented 15-seater passenger van on a snowy Minnesota highway, just south of the border near Emerson, Manitoba, on a fateful morning in January 2022. Subsequently, five more migrants were captured walking down the same highway shortly after, as reported by CBC News.
Tragically, on that very day, the frozen bodies of Jagdish Patel (39), his wife Vaishali (37), their daughter Vihangi (11), and son Dharmik (3) were found in Canada, mere meters from the US border. They had succumbed to exposure amid a blinding snowstorm and temperatures plummeting to -35°C.
Facing a litany of charges, Harshkumar Patel, unrelated to the deceased, stands accused of seven counts, including conspiracy to transport aliens causing serious bodily injury, aiding and abetting the transport of aliens, and transportation of aliens for commercial advantage and private financial gain.
Shand, indicted alongside Patel, faces four of those charges. His legal entanglement commenced in February 2022 with two counts of human smuggling relating to the migrants found in the van.
Patel's recent arrest at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport shed light on his alleged role. According to a US Homeland Security investigator's affidavit supporting the arrest, Patel purportedly recruited and remunerated Shand to facilitate the migrants' transportation upon their border crossing into the US, reported CBC News.
Following his detainment in Chicago, Patel was transferred to Minnesota, where he is presently detained in a Sherburne County jail, awaiting arraignment, the date for which remains unspecified.
(ANI) This is a syndicated news feed. HBTV has edited it for clarity.