11 people indicted over deaths of six people in cargo container in Texas | Texas

A U.S. attorney announced Friday that a federal indictment has been filed against 11 people in the smuggling killings of six immigrants whose bodies were found in a railroad cargo container in Texas in May.

Six people were found dead in a railroad yard shipping container in Laredo, on the U.S.-Mexico border. The men came from Honduras and Mexico and included a 14-year-old boy, all of whom were part of a human smuggling effort on a freight train, authorities said.

The oldest victim was 56 years old. Laredo is home to a popular land port bustling with commercial activity between Mexico and the United States, which led investigators early to believe the deaths were the result of smuggling.

The bodies were discovered by a Union Pacific employee. The Webb County medical examiner suspected the deaths were caused by hyperthermia or heatstroke.

Smuggling on trains has long been a concern because U.S.-bound trains often slow or stop in Mexico before crossing the border. This creates an opportunity for smugglers or immigrants to board the train or hide drugs or other contraband on the train before entering the United States.

“It’s very difficult to survive in a closed container with no air conditioning, when the temperature is what it was that day,” Justin Simmons, the U.S. attorney for the western district of Texas, said Friday.

At the time of the tragedy, Paul Nixon, a retired teacher and volunteer with the Arizona-based humanitarian organization Green Valley-Sahuarita Samaritans, said he knew what put people at risk of hiding on the train.

“We talked to people who were traveling on foot brutally over the land, with a lot of cartel abuse going on, [so] “If there were an alternative, it seems to me that this might be one of the things people would do,” Nixon said, adding that the climate crisis is worsening the already extreme conditions in the border region.

“But people will get on the boxcar and someone will close the door and forget they’re there,” he said. “I mean, this is a death sentence,” he said.

Associated Press contributed reporting