A Shelby resident, Kristin Louise Mitchell, was sentenced to three months in prison followed by two years of supervised release for attempting to harbor illegal aliens, according to U.S. Attorney Kurt Alme. Mitchell, 41, was found guilty at trial of one count of attempted harboring of illegal aliens. The sentencing was handed down by Chief U.S. District Judge Brian M. Morris.
Court documents revealed that the case began on February 21, 2025, when a Montana Highway Patrol officer conducted a traffic stop in Gallatin County due to fictitious license plates on a vehicle. Although the driver was cited and released, a subsequent registration check on February 25 linked the vehicle back to this incident.
On March 4, Border Patrol agents observed Mitchell driving the same vehicle with two male passengers. Deputies from the Toole County Sheriff’s Office stopped her after she failed to halt at an intersection. Mitchell informed deputies that the men were political asylees who did not speak English. Border Patrol agents were called for assistance.
A responding Border Patrol agent recognized Mitchell from a previous encounter at the northern border and tried speaking with her passengers in both English and Spanish. When asked about their citizenship, "Mitchell answered for them and claimed they were political asylees from Venezuela." She also referred to one man as her boyfriend. Neither passenger could provide documentation verifying their status.
All three individuals in the vehicle were detained and taken to Sweetgrass Border Patrol Station. Record checks identified both passengers as Venezuelan citizens without legal admission records into the United States. Mitchell is a U.S. citizen with two prior immigration-related convictions.
While this traffic stop occurred, other officers surveilling Mitchell’s home saw another man matching a description from the earlier February 21 stop; he admitted having been previously removed from the United States and was identified as a Honduran citizen.
Testimony given in April indicated that one individual had worked at a construction site near Bozeman but had not been paid and became stranded there. He connected with Mitchell through another Venezuelan acquaintance; they traveled together toward Shelby after purchasing margaritas at Walmart but were stopped again—this time for DUI—in East Helena. Mitchell then drove from Shelby to bail out the driver and retrieve her car before all three stayed at her residence until their arrest.
The investigation involved cooperation among U.S. Border Patrol, Montana Highway Patrol, and Toole County Sheriff’s Office.
According to officials, "This case is part of Operation Take Back America a nationwide initiative that marshals the full resources of the Department of Justice to repel the invasion of illegal immigration, achieve the total elimination of cartels and transnational criminal organizations (TCOs), and protect our communities from the perpetrators of violent crime." The operation combines efforts from Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETFs) and Project Safe Neighborhood (PSN).
