Two Indian men were charged in federal court in Newark after a long-running undercover sting that prosecutors said targeted a smuggling group that brought in people via land, air or sea routes using false documents.
NEWARK -- The "packages" came from the Far East and the cost of shipping was not cheap.
The price for delivery to Newark Liberty International Airport in one case was $35,000 for a shipment from Bangkok. And what was being moved were undocumented aliens being smuggled into the country, said the U.S. Attorney's office.
Two men were charged in federal court Thursday after a long-running undercover sting that prosecutors said targeted an operation that collected thousands in fees to illegally bring in people into the country via land, air or sea routes using false documents.
Nileshkumar Patel, 41, and Harsad Mehta, 65, both of India, are charged by criminal complaint with conspiracy to bring in and harbor aliens. The two were also charged on multiple counts of smuggling foreign nationals into the United States for private financial gain.
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Both were arrested Wednesday by special agents of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security upon their arrival at Newark Liberty.
Prosecutors said the international undercover operation was launched after federal agents learned that the two men were allegedly attempting to find ways to illegally bring foreign nationals from India into the United States.
According to a criminal complaint filed in the case, an undercover agent posing as a smuggler initiated contact with Patel in June 2013, and was told that they wanted to discuss sending "packages" to the United States. At a later meeting with Patel and Mehta in Bangkok, Thailand in April 2014, captured on surveillance recordings, a special agent with the Department of Homeland Security said Mehta, who went by the name of "Harry," had a couple of 20-year-old women they wanted to get to the United States.
They settled on a price of $35,000 to bring the young women from Bangkok, with $10,000 payable up front for each individual. Their travel documents would be fake, the undercover operative told them.
The two women arrived in Newark in July 2014 and a man claiming to be their uncle picked them up. The "uncle" was not identified in the complaint.
Over time, authorities said Patel and Mehta arranged for six Indian nationals to be brought to Thailand for smuggling into the United States, all via Newark Liberty International Airport.
In one conversation, Patel claimed he had been smuggling people into the United States since 1998, according to the complaint.
If convicted, the two face up to 10 years in prison.
Ted Sherman may be reached at tsherman@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @TedShermanSL. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
