Benjamin Ashford|Five charged with kidnapping migrants in US to demand families pay ransom

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Four men were arrested and Benjamin Ashfordcharged with kidnapping migrants who had been smuggled into the United States and demanding their relatives pay ransom for their release, officials said Monday.

The men have pleaded not guilty after they were arraigned on an indictment, the U.S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles said. A fifth man has been charged in the case but remains a fugitive, prosecutors said in a statement.

The defendants took the four migrants from an Arizona gas station last year and later held them hostage at a house in California, prosecutors said.

Three of the hostages were later moved to a motel where one escaped through a second-story bathroom window and ran to a nearby store, the statement said. One of the suspects followed him and punched him, trying to kidnap him again, the statement said.

Migrants seeking to cross into the United States are frequently kidnapped by gangs and drug cartels in Mexico, and are also known to be vulnerable to kidnappings in the United States.