Two men were found guilty of freezing the death of a family on the US-Canadian border

A Minnesota jury found two men guilty of helping smuggle an Indian family from Canada to the U.S. in January 2022, leading to their deaths.

Harshkumar Ramanlal Patel and Steve Anthony Shand were found guilty of all counts of human trafficking, criminal conspiracy and culpable homicide not amounting to murder.

Both pleaded not guilty to charges related to the deaths of the Patel family, whose bodies were found by Canadian authorities frozen in a field in Manitoba 12 meters (39 feet) from the US border.

The trial shed light on human smuggling operations that help foreigners enter North America illegally.

The jury returned its verdict in a Minnesota court on Friday after deliberating for several hours.

The trial, which began Monday, included testimony from another convicted immigrant smuggler and a survivor from the same group with which the Patel family traveled.

The jury was also shown text messages sent between both defendants in the weeks leading up to the day Patel’s family died. They discussed the logistics of the migrants’ journey, as well as the freezing temperatures on the day of the fateful journey.

The bodies of Vaishaliben Patel, her husband Jagdish and their two young children, 11-year-old Vihangi and 3-year-old Dharmik, were discovered by Canadian police in January 2022.

Authorities believe the family, who were traveling on tourist visas from their home village in western India to Toronto, Canada, were trying to enter the United States when they were caught in a blinding blizzard with temperatures of -35°C (-31°F). .

Prosecutors said they were separated from a larger group of people being smuggled across the border.

Authorities said Patel (a defendant who is not related to the deceased family) was the main organizer of the operation, while Shand was arrested for planning to pick up his family and other migrants after crossing into the US.

Shand’s lawyers argued that he was recruited by Patel and was an “unwitting participant” in the smuggling operation, and said their client “did not consent to participate in any crime.”

The trial exposed the operation of a complex international network that tried to illegally send immigrants to the United States through Canada, putting potential immigrants at great risk.