Feds: Canadian man smuggled for money

Butler, who was caught last week driving from the Florida Keys to Miami with seven of the Cubans stuffed into his Toyota, acknowledged charging the Cubans several thousand dollars for the trip, the Immigration and Naturalization Service said in a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court.

The only thing in dispute is the amount, INS district spokeswoman Maria Elena Garcia said. According to the complaint, passengers told investigators he charged them $1,000 apiece. But Butler told them all he got was $3,000. He was carrying $2,000 cash when he was stopped by Monroe County Sheriff's deputies -- after treating the Cubans to a $105 lunch at Porky's, a popular roadside restaurant in Marathon.

Butler had married a Cuban woman he met during a previous trip to the island, raising the possibility that he had decided to smuggle her and her family out, as many Cuban exiles have done in the past.

But Garcia said Butler's wife was not among the passengers, who said they are all from the town of Cardenas, about 80 miles east of Havana.