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Smuggling ring shows border lapses
23 charged with human trafficking at Detroit entries
BY DAVID ASHENFELTER
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER

February 15, 2006

In a case law enforcement officials say underscores the security threat at metro Detroit's international border, U.S. and Canadian authorities announced Tuesday they had smashed a ring that smuggled scores of illegal immigrants between the two nations to work in restaurants, brothels and sweatshops.

Officials said the organization posed a national threat because it was willing to smuggle anyone across the border for a price. As far as authorities know, however, no terrorists were among the more than 100 people who illegally crossed the border since December 2004.

The illegal immigrants -- from China, Albania, Iraq and Syria -- paid thousands of dollars each to be smuggled in both directions across the border, U.S. and Canadian officials said at a news conference in Windsor.

They were transported in cars, trucks, boats and even freight trains, sometimes in deplorable conditions, including subfreezing temperatures, authorities alleged. Most were headed for work in New York City, officials said. They also said most entered Canada first, were taken to safe houses in the Toronto area and driven to Windsor for transport across the border.

In all, 23 people in metro Detroit, outstate Michigan and Canada were accused of participating in the ring. Most of the immigrants are awaiting deportation proceedings.

It was not immediately clear if more immigrants made it across the border without being detected.

U.S. Attorney Stephen Murphy III of Detroit said the investigation shows the importance of securing the nation's borders.

"This stuff goes on every day," Murphy said.

Despite security improvements prompted by the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, authorities said there is no way to check every car trunk and semi-trailer coming through the busy border crossings at Detroit and Port Huron, which makes those crossings attractive to human traffickers.

Although officials have charged several people with smuggling immigrants across the border, Tuesday's case marks the first time in recent years that such a large operation has been shut down.

"There was a complete disregard for the safety of these migrants who paid thousands of dollars to a gang for the privilege of being treated worse than cattle," said Inspector Glenn Hanna of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Sixteen people were charged with alien smuggling in U.S. District Court in Detroit and are facing maximum penalties of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Four of them and seven others also were charged under Canadian law, which carries maximum penalties of life in prison and a $1-million fine. Most of them were arrested in sweeps Tuesday in Detroit, Windsor, Toronto and New York City.

The ringleaders were identified as Maitham Aziz Alzehrani, 34, Kola Bajraktari, 33, and Fran Gashaj, 40, all of Windsor, and Kai Zheng You, 40, of Toronto. The first three were charged in the United States and Canada. You was charged only in the United States.

Seven of the other people arrested -- all of whom were charged in the United States -- are from Michigan.

Authorities said the investigation began in earnest with the Dec. 11, 2004, arrest of a man identified as Khalaf Al Bechary for allegedly trying to smuggle four illegal immigrants through the Detroit-Windsor rail tunnel on a freight train.

Authorities said Al Bechary, from Illinois, told them he was smuggling the immigrants at the behest of Alzehrani. Al Bechary pleaded guilty and is awaiting sentencing.

In the months that followed, Al Bechary recorded several phone calls with Alzehrani, who authorities allege sent his girlfriend, Bianca Gagliano, to Detroit to give Al Bechary $1,000 to buy a van for smuggling operations on the U.S. side of the border.

A criminal complaint was unsealed against Gagliano, 25, of Windsor on Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Detroit. It accuses her of transporting an illegal immigrant at the behest of Alzehrani in the trunk of her car across the Ambassador Bridge into Canada in October 2005, and refusing to stop for Canadian customs.

The following month, agents said they watched Gagliano supervise the transfer of four illegal immigrants from a green SUV into waiting cars in the parking lot of a hotel in Detroit's Corktown neighborhood. A short time later, Canadian border officers said they found three of the immigrants in the trunk of a Chevrolet Cavalier driven by a woman identified as Gina Marjorie Ross.

Ross' status remains unclear.

Canadian authorities said they monitored more than 2,000 phone calls in the case.

The immigrants, who paid an average $4,000-$5,000 each to the smugglers, were caught entering the United States on freight trains in the Detroit-Windsor rail tunnel, the Sarnia-Port Huron rail tunnel, semi-tractor trailers and vehicles crossing the Ambassador Bridge in Detroit and the Blue Water Bridge in Port Huron.

Several immigrants also were smuggled by boat across the St. Clair River near Algonac, Lake St. Clair and the Detroit River, authorities said.

The defendants arrested in Canada are scheduled to appear in court today in Toronto.

Several of the defendants arrested in metro Detroit made brief appearances Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Detroit and were freed on $10,000 unsecured bonds.

Contact DAVID ASHENFELTER at 313-223-4490 or ashenf@freepress.com.