WASHINGTON (AP) — Long before the ancient Maya built temples, their predecessors were already altering the landscape of Central America’s Yucatan peninsula.
Using drones and Google Earth imagery, archaeologists have discovered a 4,000-year-old network of earthen canals in what’s now Belize. The findings were published Friday in Science Advances.
“The aerial imagery was crucial to identify this really distinctive pattern of zigzag linear canals” running for several miles through wetlands, said study co-author Eleanor Harrison-Buck of the University of New Hampshire.
The team then conducted digs in Belize's Crooked Tree Wildlife Sanctuary. The ancient fish canals, paired with holding ponds, were used to channel and catch freshwater species such as catfish.
“Barbed spearpoints” found nearby may have been tied to sticks and used to spear fish, said study co-author Marieka Brouwer Burg of the University of Vermont.
The canal networks were built as early as 4,000 years ago by semi-nomadic people in the Yucatan coastal plain. According to the study, the canals were used for around 1,000 years or longer, including during the “formative” period when the Maya began to settle in permanent farming villages and a distinctive culture started to emerge.
“It’s really interesting to see such large-scale modifications of the landscape so early — it shows people were already building things,” said University of Pittsburgh archaeologist Claire Ebert, who was not involved in the study.
At the height of Maya civilization, people in this region built temples, roads, pyramids and other monuments. They also developed complex systems of writing, mathematics and astronomy. Scientists know far more about this era because there are many more significant archaeological sites, said Ebert.
But this new study reveals a link between the earlier people on the landscape and the later emergence of Maya culture. These ancient channels for catching fish may have played a role in helping later Maya pyramids rise above the Yucatan rainforest.
“This shows continuity," said University of Pennsylvania archaeologist Jeremy Sabloff, who wasn't part of the research.
On a practical level, the fish-trapping canals helped the early people in the region to diversify their diets and feed a growing population, building a foundation for later cultural heights.
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This 2019 photo provided by the Belize River East Archaeology project shows investigations of wetland canal features in the CTWS by the research team in Belize. (Belize River East Archaeology project via AP)
FILE - Stela M and the Hieroglyphic Stairway are seen inside the archeological site of Copan, in Copan Ruinas, Honduras, Saturday, July 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
This 2019 photo provided by the Belize River East Archaeology project, researchers excavate sediment that will be sequenced to help them date the evidence of a large-scale pre-Columbian fish-trapping facility in Belize. (Belize River East Archaeology project via AP)
FILE - Altar Q that depicts 16 kings in the dynastic succession of the city is seen inside the archeological site of Copan, in Copan Ruinas, Honduras, Saturday, July 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
FERGUS FALLS, Minn. (AP) — A jury convicted two men on Friday of charges related to human smuggling for their roles in an international operation that led to the deaths of a family of Indian migrants who froze while trying to cross the Canada-U.S. border during a 2022 blizzard.
Harshkumar Ramanlal Patel, 29, an Indian national who prosecutors say went by the alias “Dirty Harry,” and Steve Shand, 50, an American from Florida, were part of a sophisticated illegal operation that has brought increasing numbers of Indians into the U.S., prosecutors said.
They were each convicted on four counts related to human smuggling, including conspiracy to bring migrants into the country illegally.
“This trial exposed the unthinkable cruelty of human smuggling and of those criminal organizations that value profit and greed over humanity,” Minnesota U.S. Attorney Andy Luger said.
“To earn a few thousand dollars, these traffickers put men, women and children in extraordinary peril leading to the horrific and tragic deaths of an entire family. Because of this unimaginable greed, a father, a mother and two children froze to death in sub-zero temperatures on the Minnesota-Canadian border,” Luger added.
The most serious counts carry maximum sentences of up to 20 years in prison, the U.S. Attorney’s Office told The Associated Press before the trial. But federal sentencing guidelines rely on complicated formulas. Luger said Friday that various factors will be considered in determining what sentences prosecutors will recommend.
Federal prosecutors said 39-year-old Jagdish Patel; his wife, Vaishaliben, who was in her mid-30s; their 11-year-old daughter, Vihangi; and 3-year-old son, Dharmik, froze to death Jan. 19, 2022, while trying to cross the border into Minnesota in a scheme Patel and Shand organized. Patel is a common Indian surname, and the victims were not related to Harshkumar Patel.
The couple were schoolteachers, local news reports said. The family was fairly well off by local standards, living in a well-kept, two-story house with a front patio and a wide veranda.
Experts say illegal immigration from India is driven by everything from political repression to a dysfunctional American immigration system that can take years, if not decades, to navigate legally. Much is rooted in economics and how even low-wage jobs in the West can ignite hopes for a better life.
Before the jury’s conviction on Friday, the federal trial in Fergus Falls, Minnesota, saw testimony from an alleged participant in the smuggling ring, a survivor of the treacherous journey across the northern border, border patrol agents and forensic experts.
Defense attorneys were pitted against each other, with Shand’s team arguing that he was unwittingly roped into the scheme by Patel.
Patel’s lawyers, The Canadian Press reported, said their client had been misidentified. They said “Dirty Hary,” the alleged nickname for Patel found in Shand’s phone, is a different person. Bank records and witness testimony from those who encountered Shand near the border didn’t tie him to the crime, they added.
Prosecutors said Patel coordinated the operation while Shand was a driver. Shand was to pick up 11 Indian migrants on the Minnesota side of the border, prosecutors said. Only seven survived the foot crossing. Canadian authorities found two parents and their young children later that morning, dead from the cold.
The trial included an inside account of how the international smuggling ring allegedly works and who it targets.
Rajinder Singh, 51, testified that he made over $400,000 smuggling over 500 people through the same network that included Patel and Shand. Singh said most of the people he smuggled came from Gujarat state. He said the migrants would often pay smugglers about $100,000 to get them from India to the U.S., where they would work to pay off their debts at low-wage jobs in cities around the country. Singh said the smugglers would run their finances through “hawala,” an informal money transfer system that relies on trust.
The pipeline of illegal immigration from India has long existed but has increased sharply along the U.S.-Canada border. The U.S. Border Patrol arrested more than 14,000 Indians on the Canadian border in the year ending Sept. 30, which amounted to 60% of all arrests along that border and more than 10 times the number two years ago.
By 2022, the Pew Research Center estimates more than 725,000 Indians were living illegally in the U.S., behind only Mexicans and El Salvadorans.
Jamie Holt, a Special Agent with Homeland Security Investigations, said the case is a stark reminder of the realities victims of human smuggling face.
“Human smuggling is a vile crime that preys on the most vulnerable, exploiting their desperation and dreams for a better life,” Holt said. “The suffering endured by this family is unimaginable and it is our duty to ensure that such atrocities are met with the full force of the law.”
One juror Kevin Paul, of Clearwater, Minnesota, told reporters afterward that it was hard for the jurors to see the pictures of the family’s bodies. He said he grew up in North Dakota and is familiar with the kind of conditions that led to their deaths.
“It’s pretty brutal,” Paul said. “I couldn’t imagine having to do what they had to do out there in the middle of nowhere.”
Minnesota U.S. Attorney Andy Luger addresses reporters on Friday, Nov. 22, 2024, at the federal courthouse in Fergus Falls, Minn., after two men were found guilty of human smuggling charges in connection with a case that led to the deaths of a family of four from India, who tried to cross the Canada-U.S. border during a blizzard in 2022. (Steve Lambert/The Canadian Press via AP)
Minnesota U.S. Attorney Andy Luger addresses reporters on Friday, Nov. 22, 2024, at the federal courthouse in Fergus Falls, Minn., after two men were found guilty of human smuggling charges in connection with a case that led to the deaths of a family of four from India, who tried to cross the Canada-U.S. border during a blizzard in 2022. (AP Photo/Mark Vancleave)
FILE - Road signage is posted just outside of Emerson, Manitoba on Thursday, Jan. 20, 2022. (John Woods/The Canadian Press via AP)
In an image released by the U.S. Attorney’s Office, shows how the migrants who survived the crossing were terribly inadequately dressed. (U.S. Attorney's Office via AP)
In an undated image released by the U.S. Attorney’s Office, shows items found in a migrant child’s backpack. (U.S. Attorney's Office via AP)
FILE - Road signage is posted just outside of Emerson, Manitoba, Jan. 20, 2022. (John Woods/The Canadian Press via AP, File)
The Edward J. Devitt U.S. Courthouse and Federal building is seen, where two men on trial face human smuggling charges, Monday, Nov. 18, 2024, in Fergus Falls, Minn. (AP Photo/Michael Goldberg)
This combination image shows left to right; undated photo released by the Sherburne County Sheriff’s Office shows Harshkumar Patel in Elk River, Minn., and undated photo released by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement shows Steve Shand. (AP Photo)
FILE - A border marker, between the United States and Canada is shown just outside of Emerson, Manitoba, on Thursday, Jan. 20, 2022. (John Woods/The Canadian Press via AP, File)
