Two individuals, Harshkumar Ramanlal Patel and Steve Shand, are set to face court proceedings this week in relation to human trafficking charges. The charges come nearly three years after the tragic discovery of a deceased Indian family on the border of Minnesota and Manitoba.
Patel and Shand, accused of running a large-scale operation, reportedly facilitated the illegal passage of Indian nationals into Canada via student visas, followed by their covert transfer across the United States border. Both men have denied the charges, which include the conspiracy to transport aliens resulting in serious injury and endangering lives.
According to the prosecution, Patel supposedly collaborated with traffickers in Canada to drop migrants near the border. The migrants would then trek across the border into the United States where Shand would pick them up. Court documents reveal that one such operation took place during a blizzard on January 19, 2022, in an open field near Emerson, Man, exposed to extreme weather conditions with temperatures plummeting to -35 C.
Despite the evident risks, the migrants were coerced into crossing the border, as per the trial brief presented by the prosecutors. The same day, the bodies of Jagdish Patel, 39, Vaishaliben Patel, 37, their daughter, Vihangi, 11, and son, Dharmik, 3, were discovered frozen in a field, merely meters away from the border. They were part of a group of 11 individuals attempting to cross undetected into the United States. Two members of the group managed to reach Shand’s van before the authorities intervened.
Five more individuals later emerged from the fields, one of whom was suffering severe hypothermia and frostbite. The investigation by the RCMP in Manitoba is ongoing, with no arrests made so far north of the border.
The trial, expected to last five days, will present evidence of text exchanges between Patel and Shand, discussing the harsh weather conditions and pickup coordinates. The deceased family hailed from Dingucha, a small village in the Gujarat state of western India. Baldev Patel, the deceased man’s father, remains unsure about the route chosen by his son and the family to get to the U.S. or who they sought help from.
Prosecutors have hinted at potential witnesses, including someone involved in the alleged human smuggling operation who had directed several migrants to Manitoba after failing to facilitate their passage from British Columbia into Washington state. The accused are believed to have smuggled several individuals across the border in the weeks leading up to the tragic event.
