Smuggling Of 2 Undocumented Immigrants In Coffin Foiled By Shoddy Flag

Zachary Taylor Blood was busted smuggling two men from Mexico after Border Patrol agents noticed a U.S. flag carelessly taped to the coffin.

A man from Galveston, Texas, has pleaded guilty to smuggling two undocumented immigrants inside a damaged coffin that had been haphazardly draped with the American flag.

Zachary Taylor Blood, 33, told Border Patrol officials at a checkpoint near Falfurrias on Oct. 26, 2021, that there was a “dead guy, Navy guy” inside the coffin he was transporting in the back of his van.

But the agents became suspicious after spotting the “poor condition” of the crate and the American flag attached to its top with packing tape, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas Attorney’s said in a statement on Tuesday.

Two men from Mexico were found concealed inside the coffin. They confessed to “paying a smuggler to get them to San Antonio,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office said. “They claimed that after crossing the river into the United States, they were taken to a parking lot where Blood was waiting for them. He had them get into the coffin and began driving north.”

Blood pleaded guilty to one count of human smuggling. He faces five years in federal prison and a possible $250,000 fine. He’ll be sentenced on May 11.

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