26 migrants found after being smuggled in trailer’s hidden compartment in Texas

June 8 (UPI) -- Sheriff's deputies in south Texas disrupted a human smuggling operationas 26 migrants were transferred from a hidden trailer compartment to a stash house near San Antonio.

A dozen migrants were hospitalized with life-threatening conditions, but all are expected to survive, the sheriff's department in Bexar County, which includes San Antonio, said Thursday.

The sheriff's department received a tip early Thursday that alerted them of the human-smuggling operation,

Deputies arrived at the location as migrants were being transferred from a trailer to the stash house.

The trailer had a hidden compartment made of "real hard mesh" upon which the migrants laid for about three hours while being smuggled from the southern border to the stash house in high heat and humidity, Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar said.

He said the stash house was more like a shack, lacked air conditioning and had buckets for the migrants to use as toilets.

"I don't even see any source for drinking water," Salazar said. "It's miserable conditions there, and it's just blazing hot in there."

The outdoor temperature was in the 90s when the migrants were found.

Seven people were arrested Thursday, and all but one migrant was released from the hospital as of Friday.

Three suspects face charges of human trafficking, three with operating a stash house and one with evading arrest.

The migrants came from Mexico, Honduras, Venezuela and Guatemala.

They were transported by a tractor-trailer with a driver in a pickup following it to the stash house location.

One migrant paid the smugglers $16,000 in U.S. currency, Salzar said.

He said they found bulletproof vests and rifles while searching the property.

The stop comes about two years after 53 migrants, including eight children, died while trapped inside a trailer with a defective air conditioner.

It is the nation's deadliest human smuggling crime.

On Friday, Gov. Greg Abbott noted more than 513,100 "illegal immigrant apprehensions" and more than 43,700 arrests as part of Operation Lone Star by the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Texas National Guard since 2021.