Bangladeshi sentenced in US for human smuggling
Hossain smuggled 14 Bangladeshi nationals into the US between March 2017 and August 2018 in return for payment
The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that a Bangladeshi man has been sentenced to 46 months in prison for smuggling Bangladeshis into the United States.
According to a DOJ statement on Thursday, the defendant Mkktar Hossain will have three years of "supervised release" after completing his term, reports Benar News.
The statement quoted Acting Assistant Attorney General David P Burns as saying, "The defendant was a key player in an organised smuggling network that operated for profit and preyed on Bangladeshi nationals who wanted to enter the United States illegally."
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Hossain was based in Monterrey, Mexico, a town about 113 miles (182 kilometers) from the US state of Texas border.
There, he offered shelter for persons trying to illegally enter the United States. The DOJ said that he also paid drivers to move them to the southern border and taught them how to cross it.
Hossain smuggled 14 Bangladeshi nationals into the US between March 2017 and August 2018 in return for payment, according to an indictment. In August 2019, he pleaded guilty to the charges, the department said.
He was arrested on November 29, 2018 upon arriving at George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, according to an earlier DOJ statement.
"Border security and national security are one [and] the same," said Ryan K Patrick, US attorney for the Southern District of Texas. "We must know who is coming into the country, and we cannot allow unfiltered access."
Meanwhile in Dhaka, Bangladeshi police said Thursday they had arrested four suspected members of an international trafficking ring that targeted Bangladeshis intent on going to Europe, holding them for ransom in India before abandoning them in Sri Lanka.
Police recovered 26 passports, 19 seals of different embassies, banks and agencies, and fake visas when they arrested the four, Sheikh Omar Faruque, additional deputy inspector general of the Criminal Investigation Department, told a press conference in the Bangladeshi capital.
