“It’s (-8 C), cold as hell. They going to be alive when they get here?”
The text message, sent weeks before an Indian family froze to death in a Manitoba field, is among new details and photos revealed this week in a human smuggling case that is going to trial Nov. 18.
U.S. prosecutors said suspected smugglers Harshkumar Patel and Steve Shand were well aware of the dangers of extreme cold at the Manitoba-Minnesota border, but sent migrants on perilous crossings for profit.
A 2019 photo of the Patel family – Jagdish Baldevbhai Patel (left to right), son Dharmik Jagdishkumar Patel, daughter Vihangi Jagdishkumar Patel and wife and mother Vaishaliben Jagdishkumar Patel – who all froze to death while trying to cross from Manitoba into the United States.
“The defendants knew the risk of death or serious bodily injury from the outset,” prosecutors wrote in a 26-page trial brief that was filed in a Minnesota court.
Patel, who officials said was known as “Dirty Harry,” and Shand have pleaded not guilty to seven human smuggling charges.
Sherburne County Sheriff
Harshkumar Patel: charged with seven counts of human smuggling.
They are accused of smuggling dozens of Indian nationals — who paid thousands to illegally enter the U.S. across remote, snow-covered fields east of Emerson — over a series of five crossings that started in December 2021.
Shand, 49, allegedly deposited more than US$10,000 into his bank account that month.
The fifth crossing — at night in a -35 C blizzard — ended in tragedy. RCMP found the bodies of Jagdishkumar Patel, 39, and Vaishaliben Patel, 37, their daughter Vihangi, 11, and three-year-old son Dharmik a few metres north of the border in January 2022.
“They found the frozen remains of a father, and his two young children. The father was still holding his infant child wrapped in a blanket,” the trial brief said. “A little way on, officers found his wife’s body frozen near a fence.”
By then, U.S. border patrol agents had arrested Shand and found two surviving Indian nationals in a rented 15-passenger van just over the border, documents said.
Agents arrived after a gas plant worker pulled the van out of a snowy ditch. They asked if other migrants were still walking.
“Despite knowing additional migrants were in the freezing cold, Shand said ‘no,’” the trial brief said, noting five more later emerged from fields.
Grand Forks County Correctional Center
Steve Shand of Deltona, Fla.
As the group was booked into jail, Shand again said no one else was out in the cold, according to agents, who alerted Manitoba RCMP when one of the survivors revealed a family was missing.
A photo in the trial brief showed the family’s belongings, including children’s toys, diapers and clothing, that were found in a backpack the survivor agreed to carry for them.
Prosecutors said the 11 migrants were given “woefully inadequate” winter clothing. Two were hospitalized.
“One was so hypothermic that she was slipping in and out of consciousness and had severe frostbite on her nose and fingers,” documents said.
The trial brief said Patel, who is not related to the victims, co-ordinated with smugglers in Canada. He allegedly hired Shand to pick up and drive migrants to the Chicago area.
The suspects lived in the Deltona, Fla., area, and went to the same casino game rooms.
“They were part of a large, systematic human smuggling operation that brought Indian nationals to Canada on student visas and then smuggled them across the United States border,” the trial brief said.
The RCMP, who did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday, have not announced any charges in their investigation.
US DISTRICT COURT OF MINNESOTA
Photo from court documents showing migrants wearing ‘woefully inadequate cold weather gear.’
“They going to die before they get here.”–Steve Shand
U.S. court documents revealed Shand’s wife, referred to as “Co-conspirator 1,” allegedly flew from Orlando to Winnipeg to drive migrants to the border in a rented SUV a week before the family died.
Shand allegedly waited in a rented van on the U.S. side of the border. The couple was paid US$8,000, said prosecutors.
The trial brief said Shand’s wife drove about 445 kilometres — the same distance as roughly two round-trips between Winnipeg and the border — and flew home the next day. She is not charged in the case.
During the second crossing in December 2021, Shand asked Patel via text message if the migrants would be alive when they arrived, documents said.
A message to his wife read: “They going to die before they get here.”
The migrants made it despite the cold, prosecutors said.
On the third crossing, Shand translated two phrases — “She may be hiperthermic” (sic) and “She will get warmer faster” — into Hindi on his phone, the documents said.
On the night of the ill-fated fifth crossing, Shand allegedly instructed Patel to make sure the migrants were dressed for the blizzard.
“We not losing any money,” he wrote in a message previously disclosed.
The trial brief does not identify the person who drove the migrants to the Manitoba side of the border that night.
Prosecutors said they may call a co-operating witness who sent many of the Jan. 19, 2021 migrants to Winnipeg, after he was unable to get them into Washington state via B.C.
Patel, 28, was arrested outside Chicago’s O’Hare airport in February of this year. He was denied bail. Shand was released from custody days after his arrest.
US DISTRICT COURT OF MINNESOTA
Court documents showing belongings from a backpack found with children’s clothing, toys, diapers and a photos of a family of four. Passports found on the deceased matched the photos of the family in the backpack.
A jury trial in Fergus Falls, Minn., is expected to last five days.
Two pathologists from Manitoba’s Office of the Chief Medical Examiner are expected to be called as prosecution witnesses to testify about the autopsies they conducted on the family members.
The defendants are asking a judge dismiss some of the charges and exclude some of the government’s evidence or witnesses.
Patel is seeking to exclude photos or videos of the family, including images of their bodies and autopsies, and details about his immigration status, according to motions filed by defence lawyer Thomas Leinenweber.
Officials have said Patel was in the U.S. illegally.
Last year, Indian authorities said they had started the process to extradite two Canadians to face charges.
chris.kitching@freepress.mb.ca
Chris Kitching
Reporter
Chris Kitching is a general assignment reporter at the Free Press. He began his newspaper career in 2001, with stops in Winnipeg, Toronto and London, England, along the way. After returning to Winnipeg, he joined the Free Press in 2021, and now covers a little bit of everything for the newspaper. Read more about Chris.
Every piece of reporting Chris produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.