The Guatemalan police on Wednesday arrested seven people in connection with a June 2022 human smuggling operation that caused the deaths of 53 people, including children, in one of the deadliest episodes involving migrants on the southern border of the United States.
The smugglers had locked the migrants inside a tractor-trailer, which was abandoned on a remote road near San Antonio in sweltering heat and without air conditioning. When the doors were opened, 48 of the migrants had died from the heat. Five more died after they were taken to hospitals.
The National Civil Police of Guatemala said on Wednesday that officers had conducted an operation against a group of human smugglers called “Los Orozcos” in connection with the 2022 Texas migrant deaths. They arrested seven people, including the group’s leader, Rigoberto Ramón Miranda Orozco, also known as Don Rigo, for human trafficking, said Edwin Monroy, a police spokesman.
There is a warrant for Mr. Orozco’s extradition to the United States, Mr. Monroy said.
The operation against the group was conducted with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Francisco Jiménez, Guatemala’s interior minister, said in a post on X that the operation had “dismantled” Los Orozcos.
The Justice Department is expected to hold a press briefing on Thursday in San Antonio to announce “a significant arrest in the case.”
According to one of the indictments in the case, the migrants in the locked tractor-trailer “screamed and banged on the walls for help” as temperatures reached 100 degrees Fahrenheit.
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