TUXTLA GUTIERREZ, MEXICO - Mexican police Sunday found 84 illegal immigrants from Central America and Ecuador crammed under a false floor in a trailer truck, in southern Chiapas state, a government official said.

"The immigrants, 69 men and 15 women, were traveling in deplorable conditions, one atop another ... among cattle feed," National Migration Institute spokesman Erik Jan Arguello told AFP.

"Three of them had passed out ... and the majority showed symptoms of dehydration and had headaches," he added.

The migrants said they had been traveling from the Mexico-Guatemala border for three hours inside the cramped compartment. They hailed from Guatemala (41), El Salvador (31), Ecuador (8) and Honduras (4), the spokesman said.

The discovery was made by a police patrol during a routine traffic stop, he added.

The truck driver, a Mexican, was arrested and charged with human trafficking. --AFP