Mexican Man Sentenced For Vermont Human Smuggling Operation
Saturday, January 11, 2025, 7:10 P.M. ET. 2 Minute Read, By Art Fletcher: Englebrook Independent News,
BURLINGTON, VT.- On Thursday, a 29-year-old Mexican national, illegally in the United States, residing in Queens, New York, learned that he would be spending over a year in federal prison for smuggling nearly 100 illegal immigrants into the United States at the U.S.-Candian border.
On Thursday, January 9, 2025, Luis Fernando Barragan-Palacios, 29, of Queens, New York, appeared in the U.S. District Court for the District of Vermont and was sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge Mary Kay Lanthier to 18 months in federal prison for his previously entered guilty plea to Conspiring with Others to Transport People Entering the United States Illegally.
During Thursday’s hearing, Judge Lathier did not impose a term of supervised release because Barragan-Palacios will face immediate deportation upon completion of his federal prison term.
According To The U.S. Attorney’s Office
According to U.S. Attorney Nikolas P. Kerest and documents filed with the district court, Barragan-Palacios completed around 30 human smuggling trips, transporting nearly 100 illegal migrants who entered the United States illegally from the Canadian border into Vermont and then into the New York City area between August 2023 and January 2024, and getting paid roughly $500,000.
In January 2024, Customs and Border Patrol Officers arrested Barragan-Palacios after he failed to stop for a marked Border Patrol vehicle, initiating a high-speed pursuit in snow and ice-covered roads along the Canadian border, reaching speeds above 85 miles per hour, with six illegal immigrants lying down in the bed of his rented pickup truck and others seated unbelted in the cab of the truck.
U.S. Attorney Kerest commended the investigative work of the Customs and Border Patrol officers who apprehensioned and successfully prosecuted Barragan-Palacios.
