Prosecutors say alleged smugglers at Manitoba border cared more for money than lives

FERGUS FALLS — A prosecutor urged a jury Thursday to find two accused human smugglers guilty, saying they cared more about money than people's safety and caused the deaths of a family of four in a prairie blizzard.

"They knew they were risking people's lives," Michael McBride said in his closing arguments after three days of testimony in U.S. district court.

"To them, all of those people were nothing but dollar signs."

Steve Shand and Harshkumar Patel have pleaded not guilty to charges they were part of an international smuggling ring that brought people from India to Canada on student visas, then across the border to the United States on foot. They are accused of helping people cross the border between Manitoba and Minnesota on several occasions in December 2021 and January 2022.

Patel is alleged to have organized the logistics of the trips and to have paid Shand for picking up migrants in rented vehicles.

Shand was arrested while driving a van on a remote road just south of the border on Jan. 19, 2022, when the temperature was below -20 C and strong winds made it feel even colder. There were two migrants in the van and several others on foot nearby.

Hours later, the frozen bodies of Jagdish Patel, 39; his wife Vaishaliben Patel, 37; their 11-year-old daughter, Vihangi; and their three-year-old son, Dharmik, were found in a field just metres from the border. They were not related to the accused.

The father and two children died huddled together in the cold, McBride said, while the mother died against a chain-link fence near an unmanned natural gas facility — an indication that she had left her family to try to find help at the only building in sight that night.

The prosecution produced phone records that showed dozens of calls and texts between phones allegedly belonging to Shand, Patel and others. The texts discuss prices for carrying people, rental vehicles, the dangerously cold weather, specific locations in a remote section of the border, and other items.

The jury also saw flight and car rental records. An analyst with the Federal Bureau of Investigation testified Thursday that, by using cell tower locations, she was able to track the phone allegedly belonging to Shand making trips from his home in Florida to Minneapolis and then up to areas near the border. These occurred around the same time as some of the migrant crossings.

Shand's lawyers said Shand was a taxi driver in Florida who was offered money by Patel to pick people up in different locations and was unaware he was doing anything wrong until the day of his arrest.

"He's a little clueless. He's a little naive," Aaron Morrison said in his closing arguments.

"He (was) being used by the conspiracy."

The fact Shand never used fake identification and rented vehicles in his own name is a sign that he felt he was not doing anything illegal, Morrison said.

Being born in Jamaica and living in Florida, Shand could not truly appreciate how dangerous the weather at the border was, Morrison added.

McBride countered that Shand made multiple trips in the frigid cold and must have known he was acting illegally. A border patrol agent testified that on the day of Shand's arrest, with several migrants still wandering in the cold, Shand said there were no other people left to find.

"He never called anyone for help," McBride said.

Harshkumar Patel's lawyers said their client has been misidentified. Patel was only arrested earlier this year, and his lawyers said that, unlike Shand, there is no evidence of him in the border area or bank records to show that he made any money.

Patel's lawyers also said the prosecution is wrong in saying that a contact named "Dirty Harry" in Shand's phone, with whom the messages and phone calls were shared, was Patel.

"Dirty Harry and Mr. Patel are not the same person," Thomas Plunkett said in his closing remarks.

The trial saw evidence the same phone number listed for Dirty Harry was also used by Patel on a government document. The Dirty Harry number was also used to open a bank account in 2018 under the name Haresh Patel, an alias Patel used, said Homeland Security Investigations special agent Manuel Jimenez.

The trial in Fergus Falls, Minn., also heard Thursday from two forensic pathologists. They testified the family found dead along the border died from hypothermia.

One pathologist said the autopsies had to be done a few days after the family was found because the bodies were too frozen.

One of the migrants who survived the border crossing that night said the group was driven from Winnipeg to an area near the border and told to walk in a straight line in the dark until they would see another vehicle on the American side. Yash Patel said he walked for several hours in blinding snow before finding the van where he, Shand and another migrant were taken into custody.

The jury is scheduled to receive instructions from the judge on Friday.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 21, 2024.

Steve Lambert, The Canadian Press