iNDICA NEWS BUREAU-
American authorities have arrested Indian-origin Harshkumar Patel in Chicago in connection with a human trafficking case of 2022 in which four of a family from Gujarat were killed while being smuggled into the US through Canada.
Patel is also known as ‘Dirty Harry’.
The victims were Jagdish Patel (39), his wife Vaishali (37), and their two children — Vihangi (11) and Dharmik (3). The victims were h by gfrom Dingucha, near Gandhinagar, were found frozen to death near Emerson, Manitoba, approximately 12 metres from the Canada-US border while illegally attempting to enter the US.
The two Patel families are not related.
Court documents indicate that Harshkumar Patel managed a gambling establishment in Florida and recruited alleged smuggler Steve Shand, another Florida resident who is already awaiting trial in federal court in Minnesota for transporting illegal migrants.
The Patel family died of exposure on January 19, 2022, while attempting to cross illegally into Minnesota near Emerson, Man. The frozen bodies of 39-year-old Jagdish Patel, his 37-year-old wife, Vaishali, their 11-year -old daughter, Vihangi, and three-year-old son, Dharmik, were found just 12 metres from the U.S. border.
On the morning of Jan. 19, 2022, U.S. border patrol agents arrested Shand and two migrants in a rented 15-seater passenger van on a snowy highway in Minnesota, just south of the Canadian border near Emerson, Man. Five other migrants were caught by the border patrol walking down the same highway shortly after.
The latest charges for Harshkumar Patel, contained in a September 2023 arrest warrant and supporting affidavit unsealed Thursday, reveal new details about the night the Patel family died, including cellphone texts Harshkumar Patel shared with Shand that investigators say show how he facilitated the smuggling of the Patel family on the U.S. side of the border.
On the morning of Jan. 19, 2022, U.S. border patrol agents arrested Shand and two migrants in a rented 15-seater passenger van on a snowy highway in Minnesota, just south of the Canadian border near Emerson, Man. Five other migrants were caught by the border patrol walking down the same highway shortly after.
The latest charges for Harshkumar Patel, contained in a September 2023 arrest warrant and supporting affidavit unsealed Thursday, reveal new details about the night the Patel family died, including cellphone texts Harshkumar Patel shared with Shand that investigators say show how he facilitated the smuggling of the Patel family on the U.S. side of the border.
U.S. authorities also allege that Harshkumar Patel provided Shand with GPS coordinates to a pick-up spot near the U.S.-Canada border and two phone numbers of contacts in Canada.
According to CBC. During a March 9, 2022, interview with a U.S. Homeland Security investigator, “Shand described five total trips he had made to the international border in Minnesota in December 2021 and January 2022 to transport Indian nationals.”
He further told investigators that “he has made a total of approximately $25,000 US in smuggling proceeds” working for Harshkumar Patel.
For the Jan. 18-19, 2023, smuggling incident alone, the court documents allege Shand was paid $2,900 US in cash from Harshkumar Patel up front and then paid another $5,000 US in cash after his release.
