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A man accused of smuggling undocumented immigrants who died when their van crashed on Interstate 70 has reached a plea deal with prosecutors in Grand County.
Elvis Quintanilla-Vasquez pleaded guilty Tuesday in Moab's 7th District Court to one class A misdemeanor count of negligent homicide in the deaths of four men whom he was driving to Chicago to work for a family member, according to staff at the Grand County Attorney's office.
The victims were with three other immigrants in a van that Quintanilla-Vasquez was driving when it crashed May 16 on I-70 about 34 miles west of the Colorado state line.
Quintanilla-Vasquez, 36, had been charged with four second-degree felony counts of aggravated human smuggling, three third-degree felony counts of human smuggling and one misdemeanor traffic violation. Grand County Attorney K. Andrew Fitzgerald could not be reached for comment as to why the human smuggling charges were dropped.
Quintanilla-Vasquez' attorney, Cara Tangaro, has said that Quintanilla-Vasquez thought he was simply joining a carpool from California to Chicago, where he was planning to search for a job. Tangaro said he was asked to drive because the driver decided not to make the trip, adding that Quintanilla-Vasquez didn't know any of the eight people in the van. Tangaro also could not be reached for comment.
During the crash, four men were thrown from the van and died. They are: Freddie Sanchez-Garcia, 19; Rueben Alberto Perez-Manriquez, 32; Efrain Morales Carteno, 30; and Rodolfo Quevedo-Garcia, whose age was not released.
Three others, along with Quintanilla-Vasquez, were injured in the crash. Investigators said they found no valid U.S. identification on the survivors, but the victims were carrying false documents. Their permanent resident cards lacked flags or presidential images, Social Security cards had spelling and grammatical errors, and Mexican out-of-country identifications displayed off-center photos with poorly cut lamination, investigators have said.
One of those survivors told investigators that Quintanilla-Vasquez had a female passenger in the front seat when he picked them up in California. Witnesses saw her run from the crash scene, and she was not found.
Investigators have not said where in California the men were picked up.