A 38-year-old man pleaded guilty this week for his role in a tractor-trailer smuggling case that killed 53 people in San Antonio in 2022.
Luis Alberto Rivera-Leal, also known as “Cowboy,” pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to transport aliens placing lives in jeopardy, the United States Attorney’s Office said in a news release on Wednesday.Authorities said Rivera-Leal was part of an organization that smuggled adults and children from Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico to San Antonio. He would then drive smaller groups to Houston.
On June 27, 2022, the organization coordinated the transport of a group of migrants in a tractor-trailer from Laredo to San Antonio. The group was smuggled through Interstate 35 and the truck ultimately stopped in the 9600 block of Quintana Road, where the migrants were left in the sweltering heat without ventilation, air-conditioning or water.
The driver of the truck, 47-year-old Homero Zamorano Jr. has a case pending. Other co-defendants Felipe Orduna-Torres, 29, and Armando Gonzales-Ortega, 54, also have cases pending. Covarrubias-Ponce, Orduna-Torres and others allegedly exchanged the names of the migrants who were smuggled in the tractor-trailer load before the incident occurred, a previous news release states. They allegedly orchestrated the “retrieval” of the tractor-trailer before handing it off to Zamorano, officials said in a release.Rebecca Salinas has worked in digital news for more than 10 years and joined KSAT in 2019. She reports on a variety of topics for KSAT 12 News.
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