Brazil busts human trafficking ring
November 19th, 2010 - 11:51 am ICT by IANSRio de Janeiro, Nov 19 (IANS/EFE) Twelve people were arrested in Brazil Thursday in an operation against a gang accused of smuggling people into the US and then holding them to extract ransom from their families back in Brazil, authorities said.
The gang charged emigrants up to $15,000 each for false documents to enter the US, Brazil’s Federal Police said in a statement.
The US Consulate in Rio de Janeiro provided support for the police operation.
Ten of the 12 arrests were carried out in Governador Valadares, a city in Minas Gerais state that has sent a large number of emigrants to the US.
The investigation leading to Thursday’s arrests began in July, when the police arrested a man, identified only as J.C., on charges of forging passports and travel documents.
J.C. coordinated the emigrants’ travel from Brazil and their subsequent abduction once they reached the US, according to investigators.
“They left from Brazil and went initially to Guatemala, from where J.C.’s coyotes (migrant smugglers) guided the clients across Mexico to the border with the United States border,” the US Consulate in Rio said in a Portuguese-language press release.
In some cases, the coyotes abducted the migrants in Texas and contacted their families in Brazil with demands for additional payments of up to $10,000, the consulate said.
The captive migrants were often tortured and threatened with mutilation.
–IANS/EFE
rd
- Brazilian funeral home broadcasts burials - Nov 22, 2010
- Brazil busts $625 mn tax-evasion racket - Aug 18, 2011
- 16 killed as power line falls during Brazil carnival - Mar 01, 2011
- Brazil to invest $2.4 bn in gold production - Nov 21, 2011
- Internacional best club in Brazil - Apr 03, 2012
- Cisco to invest $545 mn in Brazil - Apr 04, 2012
- Fiat to build $1.7 bn car factory in Brazil - Dec 15, 2010
- Five die in Brazil when elevator crashes - Apr 22, 2012
- Seven survive plane crash in Brazil - Dec 14, 2010
- JLo, Sharon Stone bring more glitz to Brazil carnival - Feb 20, 2012
- Three die in Brazil blast - Oct 14, 2011
- Noted Brazilian architect hospitalized - May 04, 2012
- Brazilian firm declares oil field commercially viable - Apr 26, 2012
- Mexican bottler to build $140 mn plant in Brazil - Dec 07, 2011
- Brazil Senate moves to expel lawmaker linked to crime - May 09, 2012
Tags: abducted, abduction, coyotes, false documents, federal police, governador valadares, human trafficking, investigators, language press, migrants, mutilation, passports, police operation, portuguese language, Press Release, ransom, rio de janeiro, smugglers, travel documents, us brazil