Thread: Feds Charge Man Who Lost Ear With Human Smuggling

Feds Charge Man Who Lost Ear With Human Smuggling

Updated: Jan 28, 2008 03:56 PM PST


A man who lost his ear in a Sunday afternoon chase with La Joya police has been charged with human smuggling.

U.S. Immigrantions & Customs Enforcement officially formally charged 22-year-old Juan Jose Padilla-Escutia with knowingly and recklessly transporting eight undocumented immigrants.

The federal human smuggling charges came while Padilla was recovering in a local hospital.

La Joya police told Action 4 News that the Mexican national tried to flee from a traffic stop but was dragged when he tried to bail from his car.

Padilla lost his ear when the vehicle crashed into the brush and slammed the car's door on his face.

A criminal complaint filed before U.S. Magistrate Judge Peter Ormbsy on Monday said eight undocumented immigrants were detained in the incident. Four of them were stuffed into the trunk of Padilla's. car. Six were from El Salvador and two were from Honduras.

The complaint reveals that the immigrants were hidden at an apartment by smugglers in the Rio Grande Valley at least two days before the incident.

The group was put in a car and bound for Houston but were stopped for a minor traffic violation.

Immigrant Alirio Diaz-Ortiz told investigators that he paid $6,000 to be smuggled from El Salvador to Virginia.

He and three others were inside the trunk when they could hear Padilla speaking with the police officer.

Another El Salvadoran immigrant, Emmanuel Galicia-Alvarez, told he paid $1,500 to be taken from Miguel Aleman, Tamaulipas to California.







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For being so poor....these illegals sure have a lot of cash