PHOENIX — A Phoenix man has been sentenced to four years in federal prison for leading a human smuggling operation that involved holding migrants in stash houses across Arizona.
Tony Cardenas, 36, was sentenced last week in court after pleading guilty to conspiracy charges in connection to a smuggling network that involved up to 18 co-conspirators.
Homeland Security officials began investigating Cardenas in 2018 and discovered undocumented migrants were being brought from Central America into the Tohono O'odham Nation, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office of Arizona.
The migrants were then transported to stash houses in Phoenix and Tucson and held there until the smugglers received a final payment, which would result in the migrants getting sent to their final destination in the U.S.
Phoenix has long been the location of stash houses, where groups of people will be detained by smugglers. Up to 20 migrants were rescued from a drop house in Phoenix a few years ago.
Prosecutors said co-conspirators were funneling up to $1 million back into the smuggling operation in Arizona. Seventeen of the co-conspirators have already been convicted of smuggling or money laundering.
The last co-defendant in the case will be sentenced later this month.
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