‘I was very scared,’ migrant who survived crossing border in blizzard says at human smuggling trial

A 23-year-old Indian national now working as a cashier at a doughnut shop in Chicago as he awaits the conclusion of his immigration case told a human smuggling trial Wednesday he still remembers the harrowing journey he made across the Manitoba-U.S. border during a blinding snowstorm almost three years ago — and the family who never made it to the other side.

Yash Patel told a Minnesota jury one of his grandfather’s friends arranged for him to make the trip from his home state of Gujarat to Toronto on a Canadian student visa in December 2021. He said he was then transported to Vancouver and back to Toronto before being brought to a house in the Winnipeg area with a group of other migrants the following month.

When a van arrived at the house to pick them up for the trip to the border, Patel said the family of four — including two kids — was already sitting inside the vehicle. Soon, they were all dropped off in the middle of a blizzard and told to walk straight until they saw another vehicle that would be waiting to pick them up.

Patel said it didn’t take long for the group to become separated.

“I was very scared. I wanted to have help from somebody, but there was no one who could come and help me,” Patel testified through a Gujarati interpreter. “It was so cold and I was alone. That was the reason I just kept on walking.”

Patel said he walked for hours in the dark before finally finding the van on the other side of the border and getting inside, where one of the other migrants and the man driving were waiting. The rest of the group from the house in Winnipeg eventually made it over as well and were all taken into custody by Border Patrol agents.

But he said he never saw the family again.

The frozen bodies of Jagdish Patel, 39, his wife, Vaishali, 37, their 11-year-old daughter, Vihangi, and their three-year-old son, Dharmik — who are not related to Yash Patel — were found in a snow-drifted field just 12 metres from the U.S. border later on the morning of Jan. 19, 2022. 

The temperature that day was –23 C, but the wind chill made it feel like the –35 to –38 range.

The testimony came on the third day of the trial of two men who are alleged to have each played a role in the smuggling scheme that led to the family’s deaths. Steve Shand and Harshkumar Patel, who is not related to the family or the witness, have pleaded not guilty.

Harshkumar Patel was arrested in Chicago in February 2024. Shand was arrested by U.S. border patrol agents on a highway in Minnesota, just south of the Canadian border near Emerson, Man., with other Indian migrants in the van he was driving around the same time the Patel family’s bodies were discovered.

Their trial started Monday and is scheduled to take approximately five days in Fergus Falls, Minn., about 80 kilometres southeast of Fargo, N.D. — the closest federal courthouse to where the incident happened.

Under cross-examination, Yash Patel said he was given few details about why he was being moved around once he got to Canada, and said he didn’t know who paid for his trip — which Shand’s lawyer Lisa Lopez noted court heard can run about $100,000.

He testified he also didn’t know he was being sent to enter the U.S. illegally, but said when he arrived there he decided to stay.

Panicked texts

Jurors also saw text messages that prosecutors say were between the accused — and between Shand and his wife — on the day the Patel family died and in the weeks leading up to it, when they’re alleged to have carried out their human smuggling operation.

Those messages included some that had been deleted then recovered from their phones, Homeland Security analyst Devon Stefanowicz testified.

The texts and WhatsApp messages between Shand and a person saved in his phone as “Dirty Harry” — who prosecutors allege is his co-accused — detail travel information, payments and concerns during alleged smuggling trips before the one where the Patel family died about the cold weather posing a safety risk for migrants.

One series of messages from the day the Patel family’s bodies were found frozen shows the pair exchanging texts after Shand’s van got stuck in the snow as prosecutors say the migrants were out looking for him.

“You out?” Dirty Harry said to Shand not long after 3 a.m.

“Still stuck,” Shand replied.

“Ohh my god,” Dirty Harry said, urging Shand to flash his vehicle lights so the migrants could see him. “Do something please.”

When no one had arrived hours later, Dirty Harry texted Shand again.

“All good?”

“No no one yet,” Shand said.

“Go over there check f——- all road,” Dirty Harry replied, sending Shand a map with a nearby road circled.

During cross-examination, Stefanowicz acknowledged Shand used his real name — not a fake one — and address on his prepaid phone that was seized and the bank account he deposited money into. The analyst also said no bank records for Patel were ever requested as part of the investigation. 

Shand’s lawyers allege he was a taxi driver who was duped by Patel into participating in the human smuggling operation, while Patel’s lawyers say he’s been wrongfully accused of playing a role in the scheme.

Family’s final moments

Jurors were also shown photos of the Patel family’s frozen bodies in the field where they were first discovered by police.

Manitoba RCMP Sgt. Pierre Demers told court he was among the officers who discovered them.

“There was snow drifting over them, they were full of snow in their face. Their faces were swollen,” Demers testified.

He said while the snowstorm had settled by the morning, it was still so cold out that officers had to take a break to warm up after moving each of the bodies, because they’d have to remove their gloves to unzip each body bag.

The photos show Jagdish Patel and his two children lying together, his young son wrapped in a blanket with ducks and stars on it. Vaishali Patel was found less than a mile away from the rest of her family, slumped over near a fence. 

When the family was found, the father’s hand was still covering his son’s face, trying to protect him from the cold. Demers testified none of them were dressed properly for the extreme winter temperatures and blizzard.

Court also heard from a Homeland Security agent and a nurse practitioner who saw another woman who had been travelling with the migrants who had to be hospitalized after she was picked up near the border. The woman was suffering from hypothermia and severe frostbite that looked like burns on her face and hands, and it was difficult at first to find her pulse, court heard.

‘Have you ever told the truth?’

The trial also heard continued cross-examination of Rajinder Pal Singh, a convicted human smuggler and fraudster with knowledge of the Patel family’s case who was called as a witness for the prosecution.

Singh previously testified the Patel family called another smuggler named Fenil Patel (also no relation) for help the night they died, but none came. 

That smuggler has already been charged by police in the Indian state of Gujarat with culpable homicide and human smuggling for his alleged role in the death of the Patel family. 

WATCH | The Fifth Estate questions Fenil Patel:

Singh said he was testifying in the trial because it was “the right thing to do,” but said he feared Fenil Patel would harm him.

An investigation earlier this year by CBC’s The Fifth Estate found Fenil Patel in a suburb outside Toronto. RCMP would not say why an accused human smuggler, who Indian police say was one of the last people to see the Patel family alive, was living freely in Canada.

Lawyers for the accused in the Minnesota trial raised concerns about Singh’s reliability as a witness given his criminal past and the fact that they say he was only testifying because the government agreed to defer his deportation for a year.

Shand’s lawyer Aaron Morrison asked Singh Wednesday if he was making up his fear of Fenil Patel as a ploy to try to stay in the U.S., before asking Singh if he believes Patel has “connections in the Canadian government.”

“That’s what he says,” Singh said.

“Is he working for the Canadian government?” Morrison asked.

“I have no idea,” Singh said.

Morrison then asked Singh if the truth was that he was testifying in the trial “in hope that your testimony will help you stay in this country.”

“Well, I was trying to tell the truth,” Singh said.

“Have you ever told the truth?” Morrison asked as prosecutors objected, which led to the end of his questions.

WATCH | Migrant who survived crossing border in blizzard testifies at human smuggling trial in Minnesota:

The trial also heard from U.S. Homeland Security special agent Daniel Schutz, who said he was involved in arresting Harshkumar Patel earlier this year, when the accused went to the Chicago airport to pick up his fiancée.

Schutz said the woman initially lied about who was picking her up that day when asked by law enforcement, who had a warrant out for Harshkumar Patel’s arrest. Court heard the woman also had birth certificates, identification cards and diplomas in her bag in other people’s names.

The trial continues Thursday.