CHARLOTTE AMALIE – A St. John man was given a half year in prison today by a federal judge for admitting to bringing four illegal migrants into the territory.
Brice Todman, 36, of Cruz Bay, was sentenced in U.S. District Court on St. Thomas for bringing illegal aliens into the United States, U.S. Attorney Gretchen C.F. Shappert said.
U.S. District Court Judge Curtis Gomez sentenced Todman to six months incarceration followed by three years supervised release, according to Shappert.
Judge Gomez ordered that Todman pay a $100 special assessment, forfeit the $4,000 paid to him by the illegal aliens and the vessel used to bring the illegal aliens into the Virgin Islands.
According, to court documents, on October 21, 2018 at approximately 9:00 p.m., U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Air and Marine Operations (AMO) apprehended a Virgin Islands-registered vessel in the area of North Haulover Bay, St. John after agents observed that the vessel was operating with no lights.
When AMO agents stopped the vessel, they observed five male individuals on board.
Todman was identified as the captain and the other four male individuals were from the Dominican Republic, Argentina and Venezuela and did not have permission to be in the United States.
Two of the four illegal aliens admitted to agents that they had paid Todman $1,000 to transport them from Tortola, BVI to St. John.
The case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)’s Air and Marine Unit (AMO).
It was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Sigrid Tejo-Sprotte.