IMMIGRANT SMUGGLING
Captain in deadly migrant smuggling gets 9 ½ years
A Dominican boat captain will go to prison for nearly 10 years in a
migrant-smuggling case that ended with the drowning deaths of six
passengers in Biscayne Bay.
BY JAY WEAVER
jweaver@MiamiHerald.com
The boat captain of a deadly migrant-smuggling venture from the
Dominican Republic to South Florida has been sentenced to 9 ½ years in
prison, federal authorities said.
Crecencio Hernandez, 63, was sentenced Friday by U.S. District Judge
William J. Zloch. He pleaded guilty in April to conspiring to smuggle a
boatload of Dominicans and Brazilians into the United States, ending
with the drowning deaths of six passengers.
Hernandez had faced up to life imprisonment, but his guilty plea to the
one conspiracy charge resulting in the deaths brought him a lesser
sentence because he didn't personally profit from the illegal operation.
Originally, he was also charged with causing the deaths, but that was
later dropped.
The ill-fated journey began on Oct. 24, 2008, when Hernandez captained a
rustic freighter with about 40 passengers, setting sail from Puerto
Plata on the north shore of the Dominican Republic.
''Hernandez had agreed with the Dominican organizers of the trip to
captain the vessel,'' according to a statement by the U.S. attorney's
office. ``The purpose of the trip was to smuggle the passengers into the
U.S. through Miami.''
A week later, the rusty, wooden-hull boat hit a sandbar off the shore of
Virginia Key on Halloween morning. As Miami police and Coast Guard boats
rushed in, a group of mostly Dominicans jumped into the rough waters to
escape to shore.
Rescuers fished out three bodies that day.
Three more corpses were later found floating in Biscayne Bay.
''They drowned attempting to reach shore,'' Immigration and Customs
Enforcement Agent Devin R. Gauther wrote in a criminal complaint issued
after Hernandez's arrest in early November.
Twelve foreign nationals were found aboard the boat. Federal authorities
detained an additional 14, including Hernandez, who made it to shore.
At least two of that group were Brazilians who arranged the trip through
the Dominican Republic, according to ICE.
Hernandez told agents he was a mariner and fisherman by trade. The
Dominican vessel was described as a freighter typically used to
transport cargo between Caribbean islands.
''Unnamed individuals'' in the Dominican Republic offered him a trip to
the United States for $5,000 -- but lowered the price to $500 if he
agreed to navigate the ship, ICE said.
Other crew members helped, but Hernandez used a compass and a hand-held
Global Positioning System device to skipper the ship ''at least five to
six times during the voyage to the United States,'' the complaint said.
The other immigrants told agents they had paid between $4,000 and
$15,000 each to be smuggled to the United States.
The black GPS navigation device was found on the Virginia Key beach.
The case differs from more high-profile smuggling operations commonly
seen in South Florida, primarily people delivered from Cuba aboard
speedboats. Federal authorities have been cracking down on such
smugglers, indicting dozens of people during the past two years.
In 2006, Alexander Gil Rodriguez, 25, and Luis Manuel Taboada-Cabrera,
28 -- two Cuban immigrants who captained a smuggling mission that ended
with the drowning of 6-year-old Julian Villasuso -- received the maximum
prison sentence: 10 years.
U.S. District Judge K. Michael Moore hammered the two men after
concluding a six-year term proposed under federal sentencing guidelines
was not enough punishment for the child's death in the Oct. 13, 2005
illegal crossing of the Florida Straits.
Captain in deadly migrant smuggling gets 9 ½ years - Miami-Dade -
MiamiHerald.com (23 June 2009)
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/miami-dade/story/1109373.html
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