2 Plead Guilty in Migrant Torture : Border: Alleged smugglers were accused of abusing illegal immigrants when they couldn’t pay to continue the journey farther north.

Two alleged smugglers accused of shaving, beating and torturing illegal immigrants at a San Diego drop house pleaded guilty Tuesday to two felony counts in federal court, abruptly ending a case singled out by immigration officials for the “perverse” nature of the crimes.

Armando Hernandez Ramirez and Juan Guevara Morales were charged with shaving the heads of immigrants who could not pay to continue going north at the point of knives and guns. The two men also were accused of ordering some migrants, again at knifepoint, to perform perverse, torturous acts on other migrants, prosecutors said.

If convicted at a trial, which had been scheduled to begin Tuesday, Hernandez and Guevara would have faced life in prison. In exchange for the guilty pleas, federal prosecutors avoided the trial and agreed to recommend 11 1/2 years in prison for Hernandez and six for Guevara.

“Just because you’re an undocumented alien and have no right to be here in the United States doesn’t justify alien smugglers exploiting you,” said the prosecutor in the case, Assistant U.S. Atty. Sherri L. Walker. “This is a very disturbing case.”

Immigration and Naturalization Service officials said there had not been a similar incident in recent San Diego history. It is far more common for an illegal immigrant to be hazed or beaten when no cash is forthcoming at the end of the trip, usually in Los Angeles, INS spokesman Rudy Murillo said.

“It’s the worst case I’ve heard of,” Murillo said. “But, again, from our perspective, we’ve been preaching that alien smugglers are not quality people. Unfortunately, this is a lurid example.”

Hernandez, 44, and Guevara, 27, both illegal immigrants from Mexico, were returned after the hearing to the federal Metropolitan Correctional Center in downtown San Diego. U.S. District Judge Earl B. Gilliam set sentencing for Sept. 21.

The two men were arrested Oct. 30, after police found three Latino men wandering on Highland Avenue in National City, two of them naked and the third partly clothed. All three had partly shaven heads, according to court documents.

Suspecting that the three men were illegal immigrants, police called Border Patrol agents.

The three men led the federal agents to a house in the 3500 block of Acacia Street, in a southern San Diego neighborhood near the intersections of Interstates 5 and 15, where agents arrested Hernandez and Guevara. A third alleged smuggler, Julio Salinas, escaped and remains a fugitive, Walker said Tuesday.

According to a 17-count indictment, Hernandez and Guevara held eight migrants for three days while trying to arrange the payment in Los Angeles of a $300 smuggling fee. Three of the eight were Guatemalan, the other five Mexican, authorities said.

When arrangements for the cash could not be completed, Hernandez and Guevara shaved the heads of the eight immigrants, hit them, yelled obscenities and ordered them to take off their clothes, the indictment said.

Then, the indictment said, the smugglers forced one of the eight migrants to perform the acts of torture on three others. In court Tuesday, prosecutor Walker said the victims were ordered onto their hands and knees.

Hernandez and Guevara pleaded guilty Tuesday to a count of conspiring to take hostages and to a count of aiding and abetting hostage taking. The case appears to mark the first time in a California court that the hostage-taking laws, which carry the possibility of life in prison without parole, have been used in an illegal immigrant smuggling case, Walker said.

In return for guilty pleas to the two counts, prosecutors dropped the 15 other counts against each alleged smuggler.

Prosecutors recommended a heavier sentence for Hernandez because he has a criminal record while Guevara does not, Walker said. In addition, Guevara watched the torture that Hernandez directed, but did not take an active part in it, Walker said.

Guevara’s attorney, Sylvia Baiz, declined to comment on the case Tuesday.