2 men found guilty of human smuggling after 2022 death of family near Manitoba-U.S. border | CBC News

A Minnesota jury has found two men guilty on all charges related to human smuggling in a case where a family from India froze to death in Manitoba while trying to walk across the Canada-U. S. border.

Steve Shand and Harshkumar Patel have each been convicted on four counts, including conspiracy to bring aliens into the U.S.

The prosecution argued the two men were part of a smuggling ring that saw Indian nationals brought to Canada, then sent walking across the border into the U.S.

They were accused of carrying out smuggling trips between Manitoba and Minnesota on several occasions in December 2021 and January 2022.

Patel was alleged to have organized the logistics and paid Shand for picking up the migrants on the U.S. side in rented vehicles, then driving them to the Chicago area.

Shand was arrested while driving a van on a remote road just south of the border on Jan. 19, 2022, when the temperature was –23 C, but the wind chill made it feel like the –35 to –38 range.

There were also two adult migrants in the van and several others on foot nearby.

A U.S. border patrol agent testified that when he opened a backpack from the group and found a diaper, his heart sank because he knew there were others missing.

Hours later, the frozen bodies of Jagdish Patel, 39; his wife Vaishaliben Patel, 37; their 11-year-old daughter, Vihangi; and their three-year-old son, Dharmik, were found in a field in Manitoba just metres from the border. They were not related to the accused.

Andrew Luger, the U.S. attorney for the District of Minnesota, said he could only describe the conduct that led to those deaths as “immoral depravity.” 

“This trial exposed the unthinkable cruelty of human smuggling and of those criminal organizations that value profit and greed over humanity,” Luger said at the federal courthouse in Fergus Falls, Minn., where the trial was held this week, following Friday’s verdict. 

“Our office prosecutes crimes every day, but what was revealed in this trial was far beyond even some of the most significant criminal behaviour we have seen and we have addressed.”

Harshkumar Patel’s lawyer Thomas Leinenweber had argued the prosecution misidentified Patel, and that he was not the same man whose text messages about organizing border crossings were caught by law enforcement.

Leinenweber said he was disappointed by the verdict, and he will consider an appeal for his client.

“It was a tragic case, and he’ll be looking at his options,” he said outside the courthouse shortly after the verdict was announced.

“We’ll have to review the record and see how that shapes out.”

Shand’s lawyers, meanwhile, had argued he was simply a taxi driver, who was offered money by Harshkumar Patel to pick people up in different locations and was unaware he was doing anything wrong until the day of his arrest.

Jury saw records of calls, texts

Jurors began deliberating Friday morning, and the verdict was announced shortly after noon CT.

The trial, which began Monday, saw records of dozens of calls and texts between phones allegedly belonging to Shand, Harshkumar Patel and others.

The texts discussed the prices for carrying people, rental vehicles, the dangerous cold and specific locations in a remote section of the border.

The jury also saw flight and car rental records that showed Shand travelling from his home in Florida to the border in Minnesota.

Patel’s lawyers also said the prosecution was wrong to allege a contact named “Dirty Harry” in Shand’s phone, with whom the messages and phone calls were shared, was Patel. The prosecution provided evidence that the number used by Dirty Harry had previously been used by Patel on a government document.

RCMP have not made any arrests in Canada.

One migrant who survived the Jan. 19, 2022 crossing testified that he flew from India to Toronto on a student visa and was flown to Vancouver, back to Toronto, then driven to Winnipeg.

Yash Patel, who is also not related to the accused man with the same last name or the family who died, said he was driven in a van with several others to an area in Manitoba near the border.

It was dark and windy, and the driver told everyone to get out and walk in a straight line until they came across a van on the U.S. side, Patel said.

He testified that he walked with the group for about 10 minutes before becoming separated in blinding snow. Five or six hours later, he said, he found the van in the U.S, which was stuck in snow. He got in to warm up.

He was soon taken into custody by border patrol agents, along with the driver — Shand — and another passenger.

Harshkumar Patel was arrested in Chicago this past February.