Last year, when investigators from the Illegal Immigration and
Prevention and Apprehension Team raided seven drop houses
throughout the Valley, just two of those homes used in human
smuggling crimes were in the East Valley.

Investigators knew that number was low.

And although it was unusual for even that many drop houses to be
in the East Valley at the time, it’s not so strange now as more
leads have emerged in the last month alone, according to a
supervisor of the 4-year-old multiagency task force, known as
IIMPACT, which is overseen by the Arizona Department of Public
Safety.

Not only are human smugglers, or coyotes, changing their routes
from Interstate 8 and Interstate 10 to enter eastern Pinal County
and evade law enforcement officers cracking down on illegal
immigration activity, they now are trying their luck along Route 87
and beginning to make their first stops in their human smuggling
operations in homes throughout south Chandler near Arizona Avenue,
according to DPS Capt. Fred Zumbo, who oversees IIMPACT.

IIMPACT is following five active leads involving drop houses
throughout homes in south Chandler, and it is hoped they will lead
to uncovering bigger operations, Zumbo said.

“Our workload is going up,” Zumbo said. “These drop houses are
all over the Valley now. A lot of people think they are in poor
neighborhoods, and they are — but they’re also showing up in rich
neighborhoods, too. They can be anywhere.”

On May 4, IIMPACT arrested four illegal immigrants from Mexico
officers say were holding 10 people, including two teenage boys,
against their will in an upscale home in the 8900 block of South
Ithica Street, in a newer neighborhood east of Arizona Avenue and
north of Chandler Heights Boulevard. Among the four arrested were
Claudio Rey Amaro-Lopez, 22; Luis Enrique Parea-Chavez, 26; Eric
Osorio-Lopez, 27; and a 17-year-old boy.

Two of the men had histories with Immigration and Customs
Enforcement and had been deported numerous times in recent years,
according to agency spokesman Vincent Picard.

Parea-Chavez voluntarily returned to Mexico seven times from
2005-09 for various offenses and in 2009 was excluded from
re-entering the United States until 2014, according to ICE
records.

He was also convicted of improper entry by an alien, a
misdemeanor offense, as recently as June 2010.

Amaro-Lopez voluntarily returned to Mexico nine times for
offenses committed between 2005 and 2008, including an expedited
removal that included a five-year ban in 2009 on re-entering the
United States until 2014.

The four suspects are being held in a Maricopa County jail
without bond and have been charged with human smuggling and
kidnapping offenses. Officers say they were holding a group of
Guatemalans who badly wanted to come into the United States and
acquire jobs, but the situation that allowed them to be snuck
across the border was becoming more violent as they planned to sell
the women into the sex slave trade.

The three men and the 17-year-old boy are scheduled to appear in
Maricopa County Superior Court on Monday for a preliminary
hearing.

Zumbo said in many cases, human smuggling is at the point where
coyotes don’t have to use much force.

“People don’t have to be lured here,” Zumbo said. “They’re
beating the doors down to get here, and it’s not only Mexicans,
we’re seeing that it’s more and more central Americans. The need
for cheap labor is fueling the illegal immigration problem.”

In the ongoing investigation involving the Chandler property,
officers are looking into the background of the owners of the home
to see what they knew and when, and to see how the human smuggling
ring was directed to that home, Zumbo said.

Under provisions in Senate Bill 1225, a new law recently signed
by Gov. Jan Brewer, penalties will be increased for landlords or
homeowners who knowingly use their homes for smuggling operations.
The law is set to go into effect July 20.

The homeowners of the Ithica Street property are listed as
Gabriel and Martha Padilla of Livermore, Calif., who paid $260,000
for the home in April 2005, according to records at the Maricopa
County Assessor’s Office. The home’s appraisal value as of January
was listed at $122,100.

The Padillas could not be reached for comment.

• Contact writer: (480) 898-6533 or msakal@evtrib.com