SAN JOSE, Costa Rica (AP) -- Authorities in Costa Rica have arrested five
                  alleged immigrant traffickers, including a suspected ringleader they said was
                  believed to have smuggled more than 300,000 illegal immigrants to the United
                  States.

                  Gloria Nino Canales, a Peruvian native, was arrested Wednesday along with her
                  daughter, a Colombian couple and a Costa Rica immigration official, authorities
                  said. They did not release the names of the other suspects.

                  Nino Canales was arrested in Ecuador in 1995 and deported to Honduras, but she
                  escaped and fled to Costa Rica, where authorities said she has operated since
                  1998 selling false passports for as much as $20,000.

                  Colombians made up the majority of her clients, but she also smuggled people
                  from India and Pakistan, authorities said. Immigrant trafficking is not a crime in
                  Costa Rica, but authorities can detain people for false documents.

                  U.S. officials had hailed Nino Canales' 1995 arrest as a result of increased
                  cooperation among Latin American governments, U.S. embassies and agencies
                  concerned with smuggling.

                  At the urging of U.S. officials, Nino Canales was deported at the time to
                  Honduras, where smuggling of people is a crime. She faced murder charges in
                  connection with the deaths of at least 10 immigrants making their way through
                  Central America to the United States.

                  Copyright 2000 The Associated Press.