A dual Canadian-American citizen has been arrested and detained by the U.S., accused of being involved in what the U.S. Justice Department says was a deadly human smuggling conspiracy that left a family of four dead in the St. Lawrence River.
The Justice Department said 34-year-old Timothy Oakes from the Akwesasne Mohawk Indian Reservation was arrested on June 15 when he attempted to enter the U.S. via the Massena, N.Y., port of entry.
According to the department, he was previously arraigned on numerous human smuggling offences in the Northern District of New York District Court. He had his detention hearing earlier Tuesday and will remain detained in custody.
He was indicted April 9 for conspiracy with others to engage in alien smuggling, four counts of alien smuggling for profit and four counts of alien smuggling resulting in death.
Three U.S.-based co-conspirators entered guilty pleas in the past nine months.
“As alleged, Oakes and his co-conspirators profited from a human smuggling operation with a singular, cold-hearted aim: making money by bringing illegal aliens into the United States, regardless of the danger to human life involved,” said Matthew R. Galeotti, head of the department’s criminal division.
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Galeotti said a mother, father and two small children, as well as the brother of one of the defendants, died in the operation.
“Oakes’ arrest comes as part of our nearly two-year long investigation into a transnational criminal organization responsible for the large-scale smuggling of aliens from Canada into the United States,” said Erin Keegan, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Homeland Security Investigations (ICE HSI) Buffalo special agent in charge.
The Justice Department, citing court documents, alleged Oakes was a “key facilitator” in a human smuggling organization aimed at smuggling people from Canada into northern New York. It alleges Oakes would “routinely” smuggle people into the U.S. by piloting boats across the river, while also using his home as a staging area before the human smuggling organization would smuggle them across.
The department alleges Oakes earned approximately US$1,000 for every person he smuggled across the river.
In March 2023, the Justice Department says Oakes housed a Romanian family of four, along with others, for about 24 hours. He then transported the family and a boat to a public boat launch, which was then used by his brother Casey Oakes to smuggle the Romanian family into the U.S., but the boat capsized, killing all four members of the family and Casey.
The three other people who pleaded guilty admitted in their plea agreements that in late 2023, they were employed to illegally transport a Romanian family of four — a mother, father, one-year-old boy and two-year-old girl — from Canada into New York.
One of the people charged admitted “he was aware of the dangerous weather conditions on the day of the tragedy.” Those conditions included high winds, freezing temperatures and limited visibility.
The case saw Homeland Security Investigations Massena engage for a years-long investigation, receiving support from numerous organizations, including U.S. Border Patrol, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, New York State Police, the Canada Border Services Agency, the Akwesane Mohawk Police Service, the St. Regis Mohawk Tribal Police Department, Ontario Provincial Police and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
The investigation is ongoing by the Extraterritorial Criminal Travel Strike Force program, which is a joint partnership between the Justice Department’s criminal division and Homeland Security Investigations.
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