HOUSTON, USA (AP) – A Jamaican-born truck driver was convicted yesterday for his role in the United States’ deadliest human smuggling attempt, in which 19 illegal immigrants died from dehydration, overheating and suffocation.

The trial’s punishment phase began immediately and jurors will decide whether the driver, Tyrone Williams, should be sentenced to death.

The federal jury convicted Williams of 58 counts for the transport and deaths of illegal immigrants during a May 2003 smuggling attempt. His sweltering tractor-trailer was packed with more than 70 immigrants who scraped at the insulation, broke out the tail-lights and screamed for help escaping the tomblike trailer.

Prosecutors said Williams was responsible for the deaths because he did not free the immigrants, or turn on the trailer’s air conditioning, which could have saved their lives. Some survivors testified they thought the air conditioning had been turned on.

Williams’ attorney, Craig Washington, said his client transported the illegal immigrants, but was not responsible for their deaths because he did not know they were dying until it was too late. Washington blamed another smuggling ring member for causing the deaths by overstuffing the trailer.

Williams, 35, who lived in Schenectady, New York, is the only one of 14 people charged in the case who is facing the death penalty.

Last year, a jury convicted Williams on 38 transporting counts, but he avoided a death sentence because the jury could not agree on his role in the smuggling attempt. The jury deadlocked on 20 other counts.

The fifth US Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the decision, saying the verdict did not count because the jury failed to specify his role in the crime.

In his retrial, Williams faced 58 counts of conspiracy, harbouring and transporting illegal immigrants, 20 of which were death penalty eligible.

Since the new jury convicted him on counts eligible for the death penalty, it will hear evidence in a punishment phase before deliberating on whether to sentence Williams to death or up to life in prison.

The jury deliberated for a little more than four days, beginning November 27 and taking a three-day weekend. They resumed deliberating for about two hours yesterday before returning the verdict.