
Men get prison for human smuggling after migrants freeze to death at border
FERGUS FALLS — A judge in Minnesota sentenced two men to prison Wednesday for their roles in a human smuggling operation that saw a family freeze to death in southern Manitoba near the Canada-U.S. border.
Harshkumar Patel, an Indian national living in the U.S. who was convicted of organizing the logistics of smuggling trips from Canada, was given 10 years.
Steve Shand, a longtime taxi driver from Florida who picked up migrants on the U.S. side in rented vehicles, was handed 6 1/2 years.
“The crime in many respects is extraordinarily serious,” U.S. District Judge John Tunheim said in his decision in Fergus Falls, Minn.