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Driver in crash faces smuggling charge

By BARBARA FERRY | The New Mexican
February 25, 2006

The driver of a Chevrolet Suburban that crashed early Thursday morning, killing a 15-year-old boy and three other people and injuring eight, will be charged with immigrant smuggling, a spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said Friday.

“ICE is treating this as an alien smuggling case,” said Leticia Zamarripa, a spokeswoman for the agency in El Paso. She identified the driver as Israel Muñoz Tello, 28, of Michoacán, Mexico. Zamarripa said Muñoz Tello, who was listed Friday in stable condition at St. Vincent Regional Medical Center, would be arrested by federal agents when he is well enough to leave the hospital.

Five people, including two teenagers, remained in critical condition Friday at St. Vincent and The University of New Mexico Hospital in Albuquerque.

The Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Department identified one of the people killed as Libarde Salvador Gómez, 15, of Michoacán. The three other passengers who were killed have been identified, according to the sheriff’s office, but their names have not been released pending notification of next of kin.

The other passengers who were identified were all from Michoacán, a state in central Mexico west of Mexico City, according to the sheriff’s office.

The victims identified are Javier Cruz Franco, 17, who is in critical condition; José Antonio García Mondragón, 15, in critical condition; Jorge Guzmán Meza, 22, in critical condition; Gabriel García, 37, in critical condition; and Hugo Alvarado Sánchez, 36, and Ángel Vitchis, 25, both of whom were treated at St. Vincent and released. The only woman in the group was not identified by the sheriff’s office. She remains in critical condition at UNM Hospital.

The 1997 Suburban was heading south on N.M. 599 about a mile north of Interstate 25 early Thursday when it flipped over several times, ejecting everyone except the driver, who was the only one wearing a seat belt, according to sheriff’s Capt. Terry Delgado. He said investigators had determined the driver fell asleep, drove off the road onto the shoulder and then overcorrected, causing the Suburban to roll over several times.

Delgado said the group left Phoenix for Atlanta on Wednesday evening. One passenger suffered a traumatic amputation in the crash and was airlifted to UNM Hospital.

Delgado said the van, which bore an Oklahoma license plate, had two front bucket seats and two back seats and was designed to hold a maximum of eight people. He said he’d been told immigration officials learned about the crash from television news reports and went to St. Vincent to interview the survivors.

The Mexican consul in Albuquerque, Juan Solana, said two men who were released after treatment at St. Vincent on Thursday were taken into custody by immigration officials, but Zamarripa said she could not confirm that. Solana said he was told federal agents planned to hold the two men as witnesses over the weekend until officials decided whether the driver of the vehicle would be charged.

Solana said he was working to contact family members of the victims in Mexico. In some cases, he said, the family members may be brought to the United States under a temporary humanitarian visa. The consulate will arrange for the bodies of the victims to be sent back to Mexico for burial, he said.

Contact Barbara Ferry at 995-3817 or bferry@sfnewmexican.com.