Phoenix, USA: Following her admission of guilt to human smuggling, a Honduran lady was sentenced to ten years in prison on Tuesday, according to officials.
Based on information provided by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Arizona, Maria Mendoza-Mendoza, 52, was sentenced by a judge to 120 months in jail.
Prosecutors said she oversaw a criminal operation that brought more than a hundred migrants into the United States illegally from Honduras.
Authorities claimed that many of these migrants were brought to stash houses run in Phoenix.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Arizona claims that Mendoza-Mendoza victimized the defenseless migrants by threatening them.
According to prosecutors, a Honduran lady named Mendoza intimidated migrants she was smuggling with threats to force them to pay the smuggling money.
Authorities claimed that the organization she worked for exploited funnel accounts to smuggle millions of dollars in fees.
Using threats and intimidation to get her way, Mendoza-Mendoza is accused of holding migrants in the stash homes in Phoenix until they paid.
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Prosecutors said that she once declared that a migrant should be sent “back in the desert” if his family failed to pay the smuggling money.
Before her June 2023 extradition from Honduras to the United States, Mendoza was charged in January 2018.
The Honduran woman, according to officials, was also known by the alias “La Guera,” which means “white girl” in translation.
Francisco B. Burrola, a special agent with Homeland Security Investigations, claims that Mendoza-Mendoza committed subtle offenses.
According to Burrola’s news release, “human smugglers do nothing but prey on vulnerable people who occasionally pay with their lives while crossing the border.” If other smugglers are thinking about continuing their involvement, let this sentence serve as a warning: prison is waiting for you.
