HOUSTON (AP) – A 29-year-old man who traveled in a sweltering semitrailer packed with immigrants has died of complications from heat stroke, bringing the number killed in the botched smuggling attempt to 19.

The man, believed to be from Honduras, died Friday at DeTar Hospital Navarro in Victoria. The revised toll makes it the deadliest U.S. smuggling incident since 18 immigrants died in a rail car in West Texas in 1987.

Also Friday, 18 suspected illegal immigrants were found alive in a tractor-trailer at a truck stop not far from where the other victims were discovered south of Victoria. None required hospitalization. They were turned over to immigration authorities and the truck driver was taken into custody.

Victoria County sheriff’s deputies discovered 17 bodies in a trailer Wednesday morning; two people have died since then. Five remain hospitalized, and 49 survivors were transferred to a Houston facility and will remain in federal custody while the investigation continues.

Most of the immigrants were from Mexico, while others were from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.

Travis County medical examiner Roberto Bayardo said in initial autopsy reports that Wednesday’s victims died from dehydration, hyperthermia and suffocation. Four victims, including a 5-year-old boy, may have suffocated under people on top of them.

“It’s difficult to tell if they were dead at the time or they died as a result of the piling up of the other bodies,” Bayardo said.

The driver of the truck, Tyrone Williams, 32, of Schenectady, N.Y., told authorities he struck a $2,500 deal with two men Tuesday to haul 16 immigrants from the border town of Harlingen north into Texas. Instead, authorities said, more than 100 men, women and children from Mexico and Central America were loaded into the hot and virtually airless trailer.

Federal authorities were searching for three other suspects in the case. They were also looking for 30 to 50 illegal immigrants believed to have fled the trailer.

Defense attorney Craig Washington said he was looking into whether Williams was properly advised of his rights and why he was questioned in a cold room.

“If he made statements, one, they may not have been accurate and, two, they may not have been of his own free will,” Washington said.

U.S. Attorney Michael Shelby said he was confident Williams was properly advised of his rights.

Also Friday, authorities in the Houston suburb of Sugar Land found 10 illegal immigrants under a sheet of plywood in the 5-by-8-foot back of a pickup truck. Police said the men were OK, but had not eaten or had any water for two days. The driver was arrested.

And the Border Patrol said it rescued 17 suspected immigrants from a railroad container car Thursday near the Texas-New Mexico state line. They appeared to be in good health despite temperatures estimated at 110 degrees inside the car.

“This incident could have very easily resulted in tragedy,” said Luis Barker, chief of the Border Patrol’s El Paso sector.

AP-ES-05-17-03 0341EDT

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