Human smuggler sentenced to 10 years after frozen deaths of Indian family at border [Video]

A judge in Minnesota has sentenced a man to 10 years for his role in a human smuggling operation that saw a family freeze to death in southern Manitoba near the Canada-U.S. border.

Harshkumar Patel, wearing an orange prison jumpsuit, did not address the court.

A co-accused in the case, Steve Shand, was to be sentenced later Wednesday.

Judge John Tunheim described the crimes as “extraordinarily serious.”

A jury convicted the two men last fall on four charges related to bringing people illegally into the United States from Canada.

The trial was told that during one operation in 2022, a couple from India and their two children were sent walking across the border in an overnight blizzard.

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