A federal judge handed down an eight-year jail term to a 27-year-old man from Pharr, Texas, for his involvement in an illegal migrant smuggling ring that officials believe may have transported thousands of people from the border into the US.
Anthony Lenard Williams, who admitted guilt to the conspiracy to transport illegal aliens in April, was sentenced on August 7th by U.S. Attorney Alamdar S. Hamdani for the Southern District of Texas.
Williams brazenly continued to facilitate the trafficking of illegal migrants while out on bail, as the court found at the sentencing hearing.
Williams was sentenced to 96 months in federal prison by U.S. District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos, with two years of supervised release to follow. Williams was convicted of transporting 560 illegal migrants, per U.S. Attorney Hamdani. Williams may have been involved in the smuggling of thousands into the US, as the 560 only accounts for those who the federal authorities have captured.
Authorities started looking into a group in 2021 that was using tractor-trailers to smuggle illegal migrants. Williams and Miguel Angel Hernandez were identified as coordinators.
As many as 115 persons, sometimes including children without their parents, could be crammed into the rear of a tractor-trailer carrying illegal aliens. Some of the trafficked people brought in one operation needed medical attention for dehydration. The most problematic tactic that border patrol agents face in the southwestern United States is the smuggling of migrants in locked truck trailers. In 2022, nearly 60 people died in a single incident of heat exhaustion and oxygen deprivation while confined in a sealed tractor-trailer.
A car crash in Batesville, Texas, in November 2023 killed seven people, including a man accused of trafficking migrants. The driver of the vehicle was at fault. A source in the law enforcement community has reported that the smuggler was evading troopers from the Texas Department of Public Safety Highway Patrol while carrying five individuals who were believed to be migrants.
More high-speed police chases have been reported as a result of an uptick in human trafficking on Texas roads in rural areas. Car accidents, which may cause serious injuries or deaths, are a common consequence of these pursuits.
