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De Lima, age 41, of East Hartford, was indicted by a grand jury Thursday, Aug. 18, on one count of attempted human smuggling in federal court in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Prosecutors said De Lima has a history of conspiring with others to illegally smuggle people from Brazil to the United States, making thousands of dollars along the way.
He regularly made travel arrangements for clients to illegally enter the country by plane or bus, and also arranged lodging accommodations for clients during their travel, prosecutors said.
To squeeze even more money out of the deals, De Lima would often extort clients during their journey by threatening to harm them or their family if they did not pay additional money, investigators said.
He and his conspirators are also accused of creating and transmitting fake documents that were used as part of the smuggling operation.
The enterprise began to fall apart in May 2022, when an undercover agent began messaging De Lima on WhatsApp pretending that he wanted to have his sister and niece smuggled into the US.
He offered to pay De Lima $15,000 for his services, to which De Lima agreed, prosecutors allege.
At one point in their conversation, De Lima reportedly confessed that he had been smuggling humans into the country for 20 years, whether they had a visa or not and even if they were wanted by police.
Agents finally arrested De Lima on June 16, 2022, when he traveled to Worcester to meet the undercover agent and allegedly accepted two checks totaling $15,000.
“He reaped tens of thousands of dollars in profit in exchange for exploiting people seeking the American dream,” US Attorney Rachael Rollins said.
“This indictment is a reminder that our office will identify and prosecute those whose actions cause danger to human life and threaten our nation’s security.”
If convicted, De Lima could face up to 10 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.
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