Federal prosecutors have charged 14 people in a human smuggling conspiracy that left seven migrants dead after they were locked inside an unventilated shipping container on a Union Pacific freight train in Texas.
The Justice Department announced a superseding indictment Monday in the Western District of Texas. Eleven of the defendants were first charged in July; three more were added in the new filing. The case centers on a May operation that moved migrants from the border city of Del Rio through San Antonio and on to Laredo.
According to the indictment, on May 9 smugglers used red bolt cutters to cut the lock off a Conex shipping container on a stationary Union Pacific train in Del Rio. They loaded seven people inside — four Mexican nationals and three Honduran nationals, including a 14-year-old child — and closed the door from the outside. The container was stacked on top of another and had no ventilation or cooling system. Outside temperatures that day ranged from 88 to 92 degrees, and at least one person inside sent a message to a loved one pleading for help.
The train traveled east to San Antonio. When smugglers opened the container there, they found the migrants in distress and fled, leaving one victim dead near the railroad tracks. The other six remained locked inside as the train continued south the next day.
On May 10, a worker at the Union Pacific rail yard in Laredo spotted a leg protruding from the container and found the six bodies inside. San Antonio law enforcement later located the seventh victim abandoned beside the tracks in that city.
Twelve of the defendants face charges of conspiracy to transport migrants resulting in death and aiding and abetting that transportation, which carry a maximum penalty of life in prison. Additional counts include illegally bringing migrants into the United States, conspiracy that caused serious bodily injury or placed lives in jeopardy, and money laundering.
Prosecutors allege the organization operated from at least April 2023 through May 2026, charging migrants or their families between $1,500 and $10,000 each and using cargo trains, guides, stash houses and drivers after crossings from Mexico.
The investigation was led by Homeland Security Investigations with assistance from Border Patrol, local police departments, the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Union Pacific Railroad Police Department. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty in court.
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