Arrest Disrupts Ring Smuggling Immigrants

Clinton administration officials expect more arrests in the breakup of an immigrant smuggling ring that brought thousands of Latin Americans and Asians into the United States.

The 10-month-old initiative surfaced with the arrest this month in Ecuador of Gloria Canales, 40, of Costa Rica. Its success resulted from increased cooperation among Latin American governments, U.S. embassies and agencies concerned with smuggling, the State Department said Tuesday.

Officials also credited U.S. intelligence “assets” in Rome, Mexico City and Bangkok, Thailand. They said the operation underscored how trafficking in illegal immigrants has grown into a widespread and clever business.

“We are getting into some fairly sophisticated, almost Mafia-like international operations that have been run to get aliens into the United States,” acting State Department spokesman Glyn Davies said. “There is a great deal of human misery and billions of dollars involved.”

Added Russ Bergeron of the Immigration and Naturalization Service: “For some of these organizations, smuggling humans has become more profitable than smuggling drugs.”

The ring Canales is suspected of operating smuggled at least 10,000 people a year, many of them Chinese and Indian, into the United States through Central America, according to reports.

At President Clinton’s direction, the departments of State and Justice in February set up a cooperative venture with overseas posts to catch smugglers. The arrest in Ecuador was a result, Davies said.

Canales is suspected of using bribery and an extensive network of airline officials, hotel owners and other contacts from Peru and Mexico to India and China to smuggle illegal immigrants into the United States, according to unidentified U.S. officials quoted by the Washington Post. Sources told the newspaper that she charged up to $6,000 a person.

Canales, a native of Peru, was deported Dec. 12 to Honduras from Ecuador via Miami. She awaits trial on charges of smuggling, bribery, falsification of documents and homicide, Bergeron said.

The murder charges stem from the deaths of at least 10 people making their way through Central America to the U.S. border, officials cited by the Post said. Canales faces as many as 30 years in prison if convicted.