Brazilian police bust coyote ring smuggling migrants to the U.S.

The Brazilian Federal Police on Monday arrested four people connected to a criminal organization specialized in smuggling migrants from Brazil to the U.S. The operation had the support of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the principal investigative arm of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

According to the Brazilian Feds, the investigation began in June 2021 — based on information forwarded by their liaison officer in El Paso, Texas, reporting the identification of Brazilians from the northern state of Rondônia and involved in an illicit scheme to smuggle people to the U.S.

The investigation identified hundreds of people, mostly residents of Rondônia, who managed to enter the U.S. with the support of the so-called “coyotes.” Criminals used a tourism company based in the city of Buritis to operate the scheme and launder money.

The Federal Police says it has identified 444 migrants smuggled by the ring from 2019 to 2022, which resulted in over BRL 16 million (USD 3 million) in financial transactions.

HSI agents followed Federal Police officers during the arrest of one of the ringleaders in Rondônia. The state is located in the western Amazon, bordering Bolivia.

Clients of the scheme were flown to Mexico, where they crossed the U.S. border by foot. In 2021, a 49-year-old Brazilian woman died in New Mexico while attempting to enter the U.S. That same month, U.S. authorities detained a group of 140 Brazilians as they tried to cross the border. 

Per the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, over 1,400 illegal Brazilian immigrants were spotted by immigration agencies in January 2023 alone. In the 2021 and 2022 fiscal years, an average of 54,500 illegal migrants from Brazil were encountered in the U.S. — over five times more than in the 2019 fiscal year.

Per the HSI, the migrant smuggling industry (including businesses specializing in logistics, transportation, surveillance, stash houses, and accounting) has ballooned to an estimated USD 13 billion today from USD 500 million in 2018.

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