Four people are facing charges in a shocking child smuggling case in El Paso, Texas.
The four are accused of smuggling unaccompanied children aged five to 13 from Juárez, Mexico, into the United States, posing as their parents at Border Patrol checkpoints, and sedating them with marijuana gummies.
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Susana and Daniel Guadian, Mexican nationals; their daughter, Dianne Guadian, a US citizen; and Manuel Valenzuela, a legal US resident living in El Paso, were charged in the Western District of Texas with conspiracy to transport aliens and bringing aliens to the US for financial benefit. Officials are attempting to extradite the Mexican nationals to the United States to face their accusations, according to Jason Stevens, Special Agent in Charge of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) El Paso.
“They would have the drivers pose as their parents and provide U.S. documents, falsely claiming that the documents belong to those children that were being smuggled,” Stevens said.
According to the criminal complaint, the smuggling occurred between May 1 and October 18, 2024. At least one smuggling operation resulted in the hospitalization of a young child who consumed marijuana-laced gummy candy.
“We’ve seen everything from Benadryl to now these gummies being used to be able to sedate the children,” Stevens added. “They would normally bring them in overnight between 10 a.m. and 4 or 5 a.m., when the children would be sleeping anyway. They use that to ensure that they stay sedated, and that way they’re less likely to answer questions or provide anything that’s going to be inconsistent or contrary to what the smuggler’s saying.”
The criminal complaint includes text messages to the suspect, which translate to English, “Young lady, are you working today? I have a boy 7 and 8. They are small,” and another text reads, “Also Fanny, I have two little girls ages 4 and 5.”
Proof-of-life photos of several of the children were discovered on the suspects’ phones.
Stevens said the parents trusted the smugglers to transfer their children to family members in the United States, despite the substantial risks.
“These children are nothing more than currency to the criminals,” Stevens said. “We want to ensure that we interdict this and stop this before they get here because there are instances where we find children that are in stash houses, or we get cases where we will be contacted by a local department where a family is being extorted and children are being held.”
Earlier this month, Fox News had an exclusive glimpse at the team within the Office of Refugee Resettlement, which was established by the Trump administration to assist in the search for the tens of thousands of unaccompanied youngsters who disappeared into the system under the Biden era.
“While we understand people wanting to come to the United States for a better way of life, there is a legal way to do it,” Stevens said. “That is the way obviously that we suggest that they do that and that money be invested in that process, because when they go with a smuggling organization, they can’t control any of the elements or the people that are smuggling them.”
