One of the men charged in connection with the Texas migrant incident that killed 53 people allegedly had drugs in his system at the time of the deaths. The man told a government informant that the trailer’s AC unit stopped working without the driver realizing it.
Washington Post editor Christine Amario recently tweeted that “one of the men arrested in the Texas migrant deaths told a government informant the trailer's AC unit stopped working without the driver knowing."
Reuters reports that Homero Zamorano has been fingered as the driver of the semi-truck where the 53 victims were found after a human smuggling attempt. When taken into custody by San Antonio police, Zamorano is reported to have been under the influence of methamphetamine, with both U.S. Representative Henry Cuellar and an official from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) confirming his drug usage.
With the complaint being filed against Zamorano in Texas Federal Court, NPR reports that Christian Martinez, who was taken into custody along with Zamorano, told a government informant that Zamorano was "unaware the air conditioning unit stopped working."
Zamorano now formally faces charges of alien smuggling resulting in death, while Martinez has been charged with one count of conspiracy to transport illegal aliens, resulting in death.
According to Reuters, 51 migrants were found dead outside San Antonio on June 27. With temperatures rising as high as 103 degrees Fahrenheit, the 39 men and 12 women all succumbed to extreme heat and dehydration without any water or air conditioning.
Authorities have also charged a pair of Mexican nationals in U.S. federal court after local authorities identified them as the owners of the tractor-trailer truck. Juan Francisco D'Luna-Bilbao and Juan Claudio D'Luna-Mendez face charges of possessing firearms while living in the U.S. illegally.
The Acting Special Agent in charge of the investigative arm of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is on record in calling the incident “the greatest recorded loss of human life from a human trafficking attempt within America’s borders.”
Local police have described the scene as “stacks of bodies” inside the tractor-trailer with other bodies strewn around the nearby area. Some of the bodies were said to be hot to the touch, strongly suggesting dehydration or heat stroke.
In a recent interview with The Austin Journal, Texas Public Policy Foundation Policy Scholar Selene Rodriguez asserted that “Human smuggling is the precursor of human trafficking.”
She later added “people who conspire with human smugglers to illegally enter the United States typically incur thousands of dollars of debt to make the trip. After entering the country illegally, these same people are often forced to pay off that debt through forced labor and sexual exploitation, which is the essence of the modern-day slavery that is human trafficking.”
