Police say a couple was recently arrested for allegedly accepting money to smuggle two foreign children across the U.S. border and drop them off at an undisclosed address. Border Report.
Lola Aracely Rodriguez, a U.S. citizen and mother, was indicted last month on charges of trafficking two young children from Mexico. Rodriguez was accompanied by her husband, Christian Velez Gutierrez, her daughter and grandson.
“The woman is driving me to reunite with my parents.”
After crossing the border, Rodriguez was stopped by Border Patrol agents at a tactical checkpoint on a highway near Westmoreland, California. Asked for identification, Rodriguez presented a U.S. passport and Gutierrez, a permanent resident, presented green card paperwork. The couple told the officer they were heading to a nearby shopping center.
Border Patrol agents also saw two young boys in the car, who the couple claimed were theirs, but when Gutierrez began stuttering and looking away, the agent requested a second search, Border Report reported.
“The woman is driving me to reunite with my parents,” the older of the two boys who was undergoing a more thorough search told the Border Patrol agent.
According to the charging document reviewed by Border Report, when confronted, Rodriguez admitted that the boys were not his but that he had been paid $6,000 to transport them from Mexicali, Mexico, to an undisclosed address in Indio, Calif. It is not clear who asked Rodriguez to smuggle the boys or who paid him to smuggle the boys.
Rodriguez said she used her two sons’ child IDs to get them across the border to California. The children were asleep when they arrived at the port of entry, so they were not questioned by Border Patrol agents.
Gutierrez reportedly admitted to law enforcement officials that he knew the boys were not legally allowed into the U.S. He said he accompanied his wife on the trip “so that she would not be alone,” according to court records.
The couple were arrested, and Rodriguez pleaded not guilty on August 1. Their minor daughter was released from custody.
The older boy was released to a “parent or guardian” in the United States to serve as a witness in the case, according to Office of Refugee Resettlement records obtained by Border Report.
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