SAN DIEGO (AP) — Two smugglers who left a pregnant Mexican woman to die in the Southern California mountains have been sentenced to federal prison.
Carlos Hernandez-Palma got a seven-year sentence on Wednesday in San Diego. Fernando Armenta-Romero got nearly 5 years.
Prosecutors say the men offered to take Jaqueline Capistran-Ochoa and her husband, Baltazar Razo-Barreto, over a border fence and into the Otay Mountain wilderness in December of 2013 for the price of $12,000.
The U.S. attorney's office says the 32-year-old woman became gravely ill during the three-day journey. The husband left to seek help and the smugglers abandoned her on a trail. She died from hypothermia and complications of diabetes.
The smugglers pleaded guilty to bringing an illegal alien resulting in death and bringing in illegal alien for financial gain.
Copyright 2015 The Associated Press.
