A woman who helped organize a human smuggling trip from Cuba to Florida in 2022 that ended with the deaths of 16 people has pleaded guilty to federal charges that carry up to life in prison, prosecutors said Friday.
Yaquelín Domínguez-Nieves, 26, who is in the United States without authorization, pleaded guilty Tuesday to “conspiring to smuggle aliens into the United States,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Miami said in a statement.
Dominguez-Nieves collected the money from the immigrants’ relatives in the United States, at least $11,500 in total, and sent it to her boyfriend in Cuba, who put the immigrants on a boat, she admitted as part of a plea deal. .
The small fishing boat left Playa Jaimanitas in Cuba on November 16, 2022 and sank 30 miles on the journey. Of the 18 people on board, 16 drowned.
There were no life jackets on board and the two survivors told authorities that the captain “did not appear to know how to operate the boat,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
Charges can range up to life in prison and a mandatory minimum of five years, the office said.
A plea agreement does not detail any sentence prosecutors will recommend, but does indicate they will ask for it to be reduced because of his cooperation. The sentencing is scheduled for April 11.
A federal defender listed as representing Dominguez-Nieves did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday evening.
In 2022, at least 269 migrants, most of whom were trying to reach the mainland United States or Puerto Rico, died on sea routes through the Caribbean, according to the International Organization for Migration, an organization within the United Nations system.
At the U.S.-Mexico border, 686 migrant deaths were recorded in 2022, the group said in a 2023 report.