Justice sentenced four men from a gang that illegally entered foreigners to Uruguay, from Brazilreported the Ministry of Interior this Saturday. Three of them were typed a human trafficking crime and, the fourth, was sentenced for attendance to the above. They had the goal of move people to the south of the country.
Those investigated are between 36 and 59 years old; two of them are taxi drivers and, one, was detained in a routine control in July 2021 -in Rivera-, when He was carrying as a passenger a citizen of Ghanaian nationality who did not have entry records to Uruguay.
According to the investigation, a Brazilian citizen, 59 years old, identified the victims in his country and the Uruguayans went to look for them at an agreed point. To enter them they used two modalities depending on the money they received: They picked up the victims in open places and left them in the same circumstances, or they took them from a hotel or boarding house in Santana del Livramento and left them in a certain place in Uruguay.
The police raided three houses in Rivera, and arrested three people. They seized one of the cars used for the transfer of foreigners and 12 cell phones. Other troops arrested a fourth person in Villa Muñoz (Montevideo).
By means of a judicial summons, a fifth person was also investigated, who also had his cell phone seized, before the Rivera police.
One of them will fulfill 15 months probationwhile others must meet nine months of effective prison and 15 months of probation. For those who assisted them, a penalty of 15 months in prison, which is replaced by the freedom regime. Meanwhile, a fifth detainee was released.
The Ministry of the Interior reported that Rivera police authorities held a meeting with the Brazilian Federal Police to give them details of the operation and data on the Brazilian person. It is so that “they carry out actions in this regard (…) since they cannot request extradition for reasons that Brazil does not extradite its natural children.” Uruguay will request the international requisition of that person under investigation.
The investigation was carried out by the Human Trafficking and Trafficking Section of the Investigations Directorate of the Rivera Police Headquarters, under an operation called Antares, and by the 3rd Shift Legal Prosecutor’s Office of that department. It was after intelligence tasks, surveillance, calling protected witnesses and surveying video surveillance cameras.
