EDINBURG, Texas (Reuters) - A pickup truck jammed with suspected illegal immigrants crashed into a tree along a rural Texas highway on Sunday, killing 11 passengers and injuring 12 others, police said.

The one-vehicle crash on Highway 59 near Goliad, Texas, some 80 miles south of San Antonio near the Gulf of Mexico coastline, was the second fatal accident in the past three months that involved human smuggling in the region.

In April, nine of 17 illegal immigrants in a packed minivan were killed when the vehicle rolled over while being pursued by U.S. Border Patrol agents near the border with Mexico in Palmview.

In Sunday's fatal accident, police said the 23 people riding in the Ford pickup truck were suspected of being illegal immigrants.

The driver lost control and crashed into a tree, Louann Presas of the Texas Department of Public Safety said.

Injured victims were transported to hospitals in Victoria, Corpus Christi and San Antonio, Presas said.

(Reporting By Jared Taylor,; Editing by Andrew Stern and Eric Beech)