Guatemalan police arrest 7 accused of trafficking the 53 migrants who died in Texas in 2022

Guatemalan police have arrested 7 Guatemalans accused of smuggling more than 50 migrants from Central America and Mexico who died in 2022 after they were abandoned in a tractor trailer in Texas.

Interior Minister Francisco Jiménez told The Associated Press the arrests were made possible after 13 raids in three of the country’s departments. They included Rigoberto Román Mirnado Orozco, the alleged ringleader of the smuggling gang whose extradition has been requested by the United States.

"This is a collaborative effort between the Guatemalan police and Homeland Security, in addition to other national agencies, to dismantle the structures of human trafficking, one of the strategic objectives of the government President Bernardo Arévalo in order to take on the phenomenon of irregular migration," Jiménez said.