Five charged in deadly migrant smuggling attempt off California coast

Five people were charged in San Diego federal court Tuesday in connection with a suspected smuggling attempt that killed at least three migrants when a panga capsized off Del Mar, throwing several people into the sea.

U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said late Tuesday that she will ask the Department of Justice to seek the death penalty against two of the men, who are accused of smuggling the passengers from Mexico.

No survivors were found in the water following an intense search at sea Monday. However, eight boat passengers were found hours later after a tip led federal agents to a house in Chula Vista, prosecutors said.

Still missing is a 10-year-old girl from India, who is presumed dead. Her 14-year-old brother drowned, according to authorities, and her father is in a coma. Her mother was also hospitalized.

Several details of the smuggling attempt and the ensuing investigation were laid out in charging documents filed in court Tuesday. Two of the defendants are suspected of having piloted the small boat, and authorities allege that two others were caught transporting the missing migrants later that day.

The fifth defendant is an undocumented immigrant who was a passenger and survived the boat accident; he is charged with having been previously deported.

“This tragedy is a stark reminder of the inhumanity and lethal danger inherent to human smuggling at sea,” Noem said in a statement Tuesday. “Their deaths were not only avoidable but were also the direct result of the greed and indifference of smugglers who exploited them.”

Federal charges filed Tuesday indicated two of the dead men were Mexican nationals, including an 18-year-old identified by the Medical Examiner’s Office as Marcos Lozada-Juarez.

The office identified the third victim as 14-year-old Prince Brijeshkumar Patel.

The Consulate General of India in San Francisco acknowledged the incident hours after it happened Monday, posting on the social media site X that two of the missing were children from India, and that their parents were undergoing treatment in a La Jolla hospital.

The complaint charging the two suspected smugglers identifies them as Mexican nationals, Jesus Ivan Rodriguez Leyva and Julio Cesar Zuniga Luna. They face three counts each of bringing in undocumented immigrants resulting in death and seven counts each of bringing in undocumented immigrants for financial gain.

The complaint said that two U.S. Border Patrol agents encountered the men near the Del Mar incident and detained them, suspecting they were involved.

The alleged smugglers told law enforcement officers that they were working under the direction of a member of a human-smuggling organization, according to the complaint. Both men said they’d never met the person coordinating the smuggling attempt but had been told to smuggle 15 passengers into the U.S., the court document says.

The two suspects told authorities that they set off from Popotla, a small fishing village just south of Rosarito and roughly 50 miles from where the boat ultimately capsized, according to the complaint.

Zuniga said he was to be paid $3,000 for successfully smuggling the group into the U.S. Rodriguez told authorities they had been given 4,000 pesos, or roughly $200, to “cover expenses,” according to the complaint.

It was not immediately clear Tuesday if the men had made initial appearances in federal court or if they had attorneys who could speak on their behalf.

After the 911 call came in Monday, a crush of first responders flooded the area to look for survivors in the heavy surf. Around 11 p.m. that night, Coast Guard officials announced they had suspended the effort after scouring 520 square nautical miles of water.

Officials at Scripps Memorial Hospital in La Jolla said three females and one male from the boat were being treated for respiratory failure. Two patients were in their 30s and one was a teenager. The fourth patient’s age was not immediately known.

The Mexican Consulate said its staffers visited the two Mexican nationals in the hospital Tuesday, including a minor. The office said the girl was provided with consular assistance, and that her mother was contacted in Mexico “to assist them in the reunification process.”

The consulate is also working with local officials to return the bodies of the two Mexican nationals who died. In addition, it said, its staffers have interviewed seven Mexican nationals who were unharmed and in U.S. immigration custody.

Sheriff’s homicide detectives will be handling the death investigations.

Eight of the undocumented immigrants who made it ashore after the panga capsized fled the scene in waiting vehicles, according to a separate federal criminal case.

According to court documents, a witness tip about one of the waiting vehicles led federal agents Monday night to a home in Chula Vista. Outside that home, agents stopped two vehicles and found eight survivors.

Border Patrol agents arrested the two Mexican nationals accused of driving those vehicles. Prosecutors charged the pair — 33-year-old Melissa Jennelle Cota and 32-year-old Gustavo Lara — with one count each of transporting undocumented migrants. The charge carries a 10-year maximum prison sentence.

Two of the undocumented immigrants who were on the panga told investigators they’d agreed to pay $13,000 each to be smuggled into the U.S., according to the complaint. A third said he’d agreed to pay $10,000; he and another man said they were trying to get to Los Angeles.

One of the migrants who was detained Monday night was charged with being in the country unlawfully after having previously been deported in 2023. He faces up to two years in prison if convicted.

According to the Border Patrol, there have been 287 maritime events — or incidents in which migrants were caught at sea or on shore — and 951 people apprehended in those incidents in the San Diego County area between Oct. 1 and mid-April.

Monday’s deadly incident was the region’s worst maritime smuggling disaster since eight people, all Mexican nationals, died when two vessels capsized in March 2023 off the coast of Black’s Beach in La Jolla.