The two men convicted of human trafficking in the case of an Indian family who froze to death while trying to cross the Canada-U.S. border in Manitoba in 2022 are seeking acquittal or new trials.
The two men, Steve Shand from Florida and Harshkumar Patelan Indian national arrested in Chicago, were found guilty by a Minnesota jury in November on all four counts against them.
Attorneys for Patel and Shand presented their arguments for an acquittal or a new trial in separate motions filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Minnesota.
During the trial, the prosecution had argued that Shand and Patel were part of an international smuggling ring that brought people from India to Canada on student visas, then sent them on foot the other way. side of the border towards the United States.
They were accused of making smuggling trips between Manitoba and Minnesota on multiple occasions in December 2021 and January 2022.
Patel allegedly arranged the logistics and paid Shand to pick up the migrants from the U.S. side in rental vehicles.
Shand was arrested while driving a pickup truck on a remote road just south of the border during a snowstorm on January 19, 2022, when the temperature was –23C, but the wind chill made the impression that the temperature was between –35 and –38.
There were two adult migrants in the van and several others were found on foot nearby.
Hours later, the frozen bodies of Jagdish Patel, 39; his wife Vaishaliben Patel, 37; their 11-year-old daughter, Vihangi; and their three-year-old son, Dharmik, were found in a field in Manitoba, just meters from the U.S. border.
Jagdish Patel (left to right), his son Dharmik, his wife and mother Vaishaliben and his daughter Vihangi are shown in a distributed photo.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO-Amritbhai Vakil
The family was not related to Harshkumar Patel.
Attorneys for Patel and Shand argue that the evidence presented to the jury was insufficient to prove the men’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
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A motion filed by Patel’s attorney, Thomas Leinenweber, claims no evidence has been presented proving his client was involved in the plot or that he knew the individuals being transported were crossing the border illegally.
“No witness testified that Patel knew or acted with reckless disregard that the people crossing the border were aliens who were not legally in the United States,” the motion states. “Similarly, there was no forensic testimony indicating that Patel knew or acted without regard to this fact.”
“Because this is an essential element of the four counts on which Patel was convicted, this Court should enter an order granting judgment of acquittal on all counts.”
The motion also claims that Patel was not “Dirty Harry” – the contact stored in Shand’s phone that Shand was communicating with.
Patel’s attorney filed another motion requesting, in the absence of an acquittal, that a new trial be ordered.
That motion argues in part that Patel should receive a new trial because the court denied his previous request to be tried separately from Shand.
According to the motion, a joint trial was unfair because Shand’s defense in court rested entirely on Patel’s guilt.
“Shand’s attorney has repeatedly argued that Shand was an innocent taxi driver who was simply picking up passengers at the Canada-United States border at Patel’s request,” the motion states.
Because of his co-defendant’s strategy, “Patel was forced to confront two parties trying to establish his guilt – the government and the co-defendant,” he continues.
Patel’s lawyer says this scenario “was clearly irreconcilable with Patel’s right to a fair trial” and ensured that the jury could not “compartmentalize” the evidence presented to it.
Despite this, Patel’s motion for a new trial also indicates that he joins all arguments made by Shand in Shand’s motion for a new trial.
Shand’s motion, filed by attorney Aaron Morrison, also argues that the evidence presented at trial was insufficient to prove his guilt.
The motion also argues that if the government’s “delayed disclosures” of evidence had been filed on time, the outcome of the trial could have been different.
Patel and Shand are expected to be sentenced in March.
© 2025 The Canadian Press