After being abandoned in what appears to be an organised human smuggling operation, four Indians, including an infant, died from exposure to extreme cold on the Canadian side of the US border.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) in Manitoba received “concerning information” from their counterparts on Wednesday morning that the US Customs and Border Protection (USBP) had apprehended a group of people who had crossed into the US from Canada near the town of Emerson.

According to a press release from the Manitoba RCMP, one of the adults had items intended for an infant, but no infant was present with the group.

A search began, and four hours later, at about 1.30 p.m. local time, RCMP officers discovered the bodies of three people near the town of Emerson on the Canadian side of the border. “Fearing that there might be more victims,” the release stated, “officers continued their search and discovered the body of an additional male, believed to be in his mid-teens.”

The United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Minnesota said in a statement that law enforcement encountered five Indian nationals about a quarter mile south of the Canadian border that day. They explained that they had crossed the border “expecting to be picked up by someone” and that they had “estimated they had been walking for over 11 hours.”

One of them was carrying a backpack for a family of four Indian nationals “who had walked with his group earlier in the day but had become separated during the night.” Children’s clothes, a diaper, toys, and some children’s medication were all in the backpack.”

USBP later received a report from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police that four bodies had been discovered frozen just inside the Canadian side of the international border, according to the release. The bodies were tentatively identified as the separated family of four.

US authorities arrested Steve Shand, a 47-year-old Florida resident, for allegedly “smuggling undocumented foreign nationals.”

The infant, a male teenager, an adult male, and an adult female are among the four indians who have died. They haven’t been identified yet.

“We are very concerned that this attempted crossing may have been facilitated in some way and that these four indians, including an infant, were left on their own in the middle of a blizzard when the weather hovered around -35°C factoring in the wind,” Manitoba RCMP Assistant Commissioner Jane MacLatchy told the media on Thursday. These victims faced not only the cold weather, but also endless fields, large snowdrifts and complete darkness.”

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