Florida Man Arrested in Northern MN for Alleged Human Smuggling

LANCASTER -- A Florida man is in jail for allegedly trying to smuggle several people into the United States in northern Minnesota.

On Wednesday law enforcement agents with Homeland Security assisted the U.S. Border Patrol with a traffic stop. They stopped a passenger van in a rural area just south of the Canadian border.

The driver of the vehicle was identified as 47-year-old Steve Shand.

Two passengers were determined to be undocumented Indian Nationals.

Agents later found five more Indian nationals about a quarter-mile south of the border walking in the direction where Shand was arrested. The group estimated they had been walking for about 11 hours.

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Border Patrol then got a report from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police that four bodies were found frozen just inside the Canadian side of the border. The dead bodies were tentatively identified as a family of four that was separated from the group.

They have been identified as An adult male; An adult female, A teenage boy, and An infant.

Two surviving members suffered serious injuries and were taken to the hospital.