Three members of a human smuggling operation connected to a Mexican cartel were convicted this week in a single day of federal jury trial in Texas, according to Breitbart News, with prosecutors tying the group to kidnapping, extortion and multiple killings — including one in which a victim was shot, doused in acid and then burned inside a vehicle.
Israel Ramirez Perez, Ricardo Rojas Vasquez and David Christopher Ewell were found guilty on multiple counts, among them human smuggling resulting in death and conspiracy to commit human smuggling resulting in deaths. Both charges carry a maximum penalty of life in prison. All three remain in custody pending sentencing.
The convictions stem from an organization run by Alejandro Santoyo Guzman, whom prosecutors describe as linked to the Cartel Del Noreste faction of Los Zetas — a group the U.S. government has previously designated as a foreign terrorist organization.
A sprawling operation across state lines
Court documents from Santoyo Guzman’s case lay out the scale of the enterprise. According to the filings, his cell was responsible for at least 1,000 successful smuggling attempts and roughly 300 that failed. Authorities have not determined how many migrants were actually moved over the course of the operation.
Santoyo Guzman pleaded guilty to the charges against him earlier this year and is scheduled to be sentenced in December.
Prosecutors said the network stretched across Texas, Oklahoma and beyond. Santoyo Guzman hired drivers to collect migrants who had crossed the border and ferry them to agreed-upon cities. In a number of instances, those drives ended in tragedy when drivers attempted to outrun law enforcement and crashed, killing passengers.
Even after Santoyo Guzman was arrested in Oklahoma, the cell kept running under his indirect supervision, according to the government’s account. Ewell is believed to have served as a coordinator and negotiator for the operation.
Federal officials have said the group did not stop at transportation. Once migrants arrived in their destination cities, members would extort them, threatening violence against them or their families to keep the payments coming.
A barbershop shooting caught on video
One episode described by prosecutors unfolded in a Houston barbershop, where two migrants tried to push back against the fees being demanded of them. Surveillance footage captured the confrontation, showing Rojas Vasquez drawing a handgun and opening fire.
Ramirez Perez, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, acted as the enforcer for both Santoyo Guzman and Rojas Vasquez, and has been tied to kidnappings, hostage-taking and murders on both sides of the border. In one case in Mexico, he shot a man and then attempted to dissolve the body in acid. When that approach failed, prosecutors say, he loaded the man into a vehicle and set the car ablaze — then filmed the burning wreckage as proof of the killing for his superiors.
The three defendants were tried together, and the jury returned its verdicts after a proceeding that lasted a single day. Their sentencings have not yet been scheduled.
The case adds to a growing docket of federal prosecutions targeting smuggling networks aligned with the Cartel Del Noreste, a splinter of Los Zetas that operates heavily along the Texas-Mexico corridor. Federal authorities have increasingly pursued charges that carry death-resulting enhancements, which allow for life sentences when migrants die during the course of a smuggling venture.
Breitbart’s reporting on the case was produced through its Cartel Chronicles project, which covers cartel activity and border crime.
Source: www.breitbart.com — https://www.breitbart.com/border/2026/10/22/human-smuggler-convicted-of-shooting-and-setting-fire-to-victim-near-texas-border/