Jury Recesses for Weekend in Trial of 11 Accused of Smuggling Aliens

TUCSON — With more than 30 hours of deliberations completed, the jury in the trial of 11 church workers accused of conspiring to smuggle illegal aliens into the United States recessed late Friday without a verdict.

The jurors, who are not being sequestered, left the federal district courthouse here at about 4:30 p.m., after a day that passed without written or oral communication from them. They are to resume deliberations on the 30-count indictment Tuesday morning.

The 11 defendants, from the Tucson and Nogales, Mexico, areas, are accused of conspiracy to help illegal aliens, whom they consider refugees, from Central America enter and settle in the United States by means of a 20th-Century “underground railroad.”

The 11, including the co-founders of the nation’s sanctuary movement, have contended that the Central Americans they have helped are legally entitled to refugee status--improperly denied them by the Reagan Administration--in this country.

They also claimed, although they were restricted in presenting their court case here, that their activities were a church ministry to help people who face repression in their Central American homelands.