A Texas woman pleaded guilty Thursday for her role in a scheme to illegally transport hundreds of foreign nationals within the U.S., according to authorities.
She also conspired to launder the proceeds of illicit human smuggling, officials stated.
According to court documents, Erminia Serrano Piedra, aka Irma and Boss Lady, 32, led a human smuggling organization.
The organization was involved in the unlawful transportation and movement of hundreds of migrants within the United States. The organization harbored and concealed the migrants from detection by law enforcement authorities
. The migrants were citizens of Mexico, Guatemala, and Colombia, and they or their families paid members of the organization to help them travel illegally to and within the United States, according to authorities.
The organization used drivers to pick up migrants near the U.S.-Mexico border and transport them further into the United States, often harboring the migrants at “stash houses” along the way.
Drivers for the human smuggling organization hid migrants in suitcases placed in pickup trucks and crammed migrants into tractor-trailers, covered beds of pickup trucks, repurposed water tankers, and wooden crates strapped to flatbed trailers.
The methods used by the organization to transport migrants placed their lives in danger, as they were frequently held in confined spaces with little ventilation that became overheated, and they were driven at high speeds with no vehicle safety devices. Members of the organization commonly referred to the migrants as “boxes,” “packages,” or “pieces.”
Typically, the fee paid to the organization was approximately $8,000, with $3,000 paid upfront to smugglers in Mexico and the remainder paid once the migrants entered the United States.
Payments were routed through various accounts all over the United States, and the money from those accounts was then transmitted to the organization’s leaders.
According to her plea agreement, Serrano Piedra admitted to stating during the conspiracy that she made a lot of money from her involvement in human smuggling. He also admitted going to continue making a lot of money in the future.
She also stated that she had been doing this “for a lifetime already” and was not planning to retire.
Piedra also pleaded guilty to conspiracy to engage in financial transactions designed to conceal the nature, location, source, ownership, and control of ill-gotten proceeds of illicit human smuggling.
The organization’s leaders recruited and used straw recipients to accept human smuggling proceeds in the recipients’ bank accounts and then transferred the proceeds to the leaders under the pretense of work payments.
The defendants also incorporated businesses and opened business accounts to transfer the human smuggling proceeds. The defendants recruited individuals in the construction industry who accepted human smuggling proceeds as cash in exchange for checks from the recruited individuals’ business bank accounts.
Serrano agreed to the criminal forfeiture of two properties with current estimated values of $2,275,000 and $515,000 purchased with the illicit proceeds of human smuggling, as well as a monetary judgment of $942,537.
Serrano Piedra is scheduled to be sentenced on April 10 and faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.
The Justice Department also announced the guilty pleas of ten other defendants charged in the case who previously pleaded guilty for their roles in the scheme.
Kevin Daniel Nuber, aka Captain, 42, and Laura Nuber, aka Barbie, 41, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to transport aliens, placing in jeopardy the life of any person, and conspiracy to harbor aliens for commercial advantage and private financial gain.
Christine Dangler, aka Tinkerbell, 46; Lloyd Bexley, 53; Jeremy Dickens, 47; Juan Manuel Hernandez Cordova, aka Tio, 46; David Scott Tallant, 54; Katie Ann Garcia, aka Guera, 40; and Abraham Geber Lopez, 28, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to transport and move aliens, placing in jeopardy the life of any person.
Oliveria Campuzano Piedra, 54, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to harbor an alien for profit. These defendants are awaiting sentencing.