Mexican Faces 33 Months In Prison For Transport of Unaccompanied Minor
(Photo : Photo by PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images)
A Mexican was sentenced today to 2 years and nine months in prison for illegally transporting an unaccompanied 8-year-old child from Mexico.
Victor Manuel Monsivais, 67, intended to give the child back to another person involved in smuggling the child from Mexico into the United States, in a statement released by the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Western District of Texas.
Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and San Antonio Police Department were waiting for Monsivais's intended exchange at an HEB parking lot in south San Antonio, based on investigative intelligence.
Monsivais was found guilty of one count of illegal alien transportation by a federal jury in Del Rio in August 2021.
According to Special Agent in Charge Shane Folden, the case is a glaring reminder that human smugglers are "driven by greed and have no regard for the health and well-being of their human cargo."
Co-defendants, Mexican Nery Uriostegui-Dominguez and U.S. citizen Elida Kassandra Moreno, pleaded guilty to bringing in and harboring migrants.
Uriostegui was sentenced to 18 months in prison, while Moreno was sentenced to 36 months in prison and a $1,000 fine.
HSI continues its commitment to target smuggling groups and human smugglers who exploit people for financial benefit.
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Del Rio Becomes the New Center of Border Crisis
The remote Texas border town of Del Rio made headlines last September as tens of thousands of Haitians crossed into it from Mexico, now has become the top destination for migrants and the epicenter of the border crisis.
Last month, Border Patrol's Del Rio sector, which covers 240 miles of the U.S.-Mexico boundary, recorded 30,773 individuals illegally crossing the border, per Denver Gazette.
Jon Anfinsen, Union president of the National Border Patrol Council in Del Rio, described the surpassing figures as "crazy." Their sector is busier than or at least as busy as the Rio Grande Valley, which has "never happened before."
Rio Grande Valley is the shortest distance from Central America, resulting in it being the busiest place for illegal immigration.
However, officials are now encountering more migrants in the Del Rio sector, one of seven areas monitored by the Border Patrol on the southern region, than anywhere else - ten times as many in the past three months than in the same period prior to the coronavirus pandemic.
Shifting migrants spend or owe smugglers anywhere from $5,000 to $20,000 only to get into the U. S.
Border Patrol agents spotted traffickers shift through areas of the border where there is no wall or fence to different locations shortly after over the 30-foot-tall barrier was built in Yuma, Arizona.
Haitians, West Africans, Cubans, and Venezuelans, for the most part, chose to pass through Del Rio, according to Anfinsen.
The migrants also installed the infrastructure needed, as well as individuals who can speak other different languages that might help facilitate as they try to get past the borders, said Anfinsen.
This article is owned by Latin Post.
Written by: Jess Smith
WATCH: Faces and stories behind the surge of unaccompanied minors at US border - from ABC News