Human Smuggler With Suspected Illegal Immigrants Stopped In Wheat Ridge, CO

A human smuggler is caught at a 24-hour King Soopers in Wheat Ridge when passengers (suspected illegal immigrants from Mexico) spent too much time freshening up in the restroom:

A man accused of smuggling 11 Mexicans into the U.S. is being held at the Jefferson County Jail.

Police say King Soopers security called to report several suspected illegal immigrants spending long periods of time in the restrooms of the store on the 3400 block of Youngfield Street.

Officers say the six men and four women had arrived from Mexico in a 6-passenger F-150 pickup truck. They had not showered in recent days and were using the restrooms at the store to wash up.

The men and women ranged in age from 18 to 36 years old. Many told police they paid the driver anywhere from $500 to $1,000 to be driven from a village in Mexico to Georgia where they were planning to work on a farm.

Police arrested the driver of the truck, 36-year-old Abram Calderon-Garcia of Mexico on charges of smuggling humans, a class three felony. He is scheduled to appear in court Wednesday morning.

A ride from Mexico to Georgia via Colorado is quite a circuitous route--and just a small part of the massive human smuggling operation that takes thousands of illegal immigrants in hundreds of vehicles a week across Colorado's interstate highways. At least this story has a happy ending, no one was injured.

Just a day earlier, 8 of 15 suspected illegal immigrants from Guatemala and Mexico perished on a remote highway in southeast Utah.