Justice Department attorneys sentenced two men for their roles in a human smuggling scheme that involved moving illegal aliens across the Canadian border into the United States.

Harshkumar Ramanlal Patel, an Indian national, was sentenced to ten years and one month in prison for his role in the scheme, after which he will be removed from the country. Steve Anthony Shand, his accomplice, received six years and six months in prison.

The individuals were “part of a large-scale human-smuggling operation that brought Indian nationals to Canada on fraudulent student visas and then smuggled them into the United States across the northern border,” according to the Justice Department.

Patel was responsible for organizing the “logistics of smuggling aliens from Manitoba, Canada, into the United States” alongside other conspirators, while Shand “picked up the aliens just south of the Canadian border in the United States and drove them to Chicago.”

The typical rate for smuggling an illegal alien across the border was $100,000. On at least one occasion, Patel and Shand orchestrated the smuggling of multiple illegal aliens through blizzard conditions, resulting in the deaths of an eleven-year-old girl and a three-year-old boy, as well as their parents.

“Today’s sentencing marks a crucial moment of accountability in a case that revealed the harrowing realities of human smuggling,” Special Agent in Charge Jamie Holt of Homeland Security Investigations said in reaction to the case. “The callous disregard for life that led to the tragic deaths of an entire family will not be forgotten.”