Mexican authorities are investigating a fatal crash that killed 23 Central American migrants and injured 33 in the southern state of Chiapas. The migrants had been packed into a large cargo truck that went off the road falling into a ravine.

The crash took place this week in Chiapas, along the highway that connects the towns of Soyaló and Chicoasén, said Chiapas Attorney General Jose Luis Llaven Abarca during a televised news conference. The victims had all been stuffed in the cargo area of a Ford Super Duty truck with license plates from Tabasco that went off the road.

At the scene of the crash, authorities recovered the bodies of 10 women and 13 men from Guatemala. First responders provided emergency medical assistance to an additional 33 Guatemalan migrants who sustained various injuries. The driver of the truck and a co-pilot fled the scene but are being investigated for their role in possible human smuggling activities.

Authorities believe that the migrants entered Mexico on March 4 near the border city of Comalapa. It remains unclear how many entered the country legally and how many snuck in.

Breitbart News reported that Mexico has seen an increase in Central American migrants entering the country in order to reach the U.S. Border and request asylum. The practice led to human smuggling organizations learning to game the immigration system by having migrants request asylum after crossing the Rio Grande. The flaws in U.S. immigration law created a magnet leading to record-setting border apprehension statistics. The new tactic is expected to result in approximately 900,000 migrants entering the U.S. this year as per estimates by the Department of Homeland Security.

Our broken system endures, and the ongoing humanitarian and security crisis at our Southwest Border leaves many minors and families at extreme risk of being exploited by traffickers, human smugglers, gangs, and other nefarious actors seeking to profit at their expense. — Sec. Kirstjen Nielsen (@SecNielsen) March 6, 2019

Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart Texas. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and Stephen K. Bannon. You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook . He can be contacted at Iortiz@breitbart.com .

Brandon Darby is the managing director and editor-in-chief of Breitbart Texas. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project with Ildefonso Ortiz and Stephen K. Bannon. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook . He can be contacted at bdarby@breitbart.com .

Tony Aranda from the Cartel Chronicles project contributed to this report.