160 Smuggled Migrants Found in Home in Arizona
About 160 undocumented immigrants, some who had not eaten in days, were found crammed inside a house in a well-to-do Phoenix suburb, officials said Thursday.
Several men thought to be immigrant smugglers were arrested during Wednesday’s roundup. No charges had been filed, officials said.
The immigrants, from Mexico and Central America, “were sitting shoulder to shoulder, back to back,” said Russell L. Ahr, a spokesman for the federal Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. “You could not see the carpet.”
Federal and state authorities found the immigrants in a house along a golf course. Some had paid their smugglers as much as $6,000, Ahr said.
About 60 of the men, women and juveniles were found in bedrooms whose doors were locked with deadbolts, leading investigators to think they might have been hostages. An assault rifle and a handgun were also found.
None of the bathrooms in the house were working, nor were there any furnishings or food, except for some canned goods, authorities said.
Ahr said those migrants without infractions would be sent back to their homelands.
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