Applications Containing Fabricated Claims of Persecution were Allegedly Submitted by at Least 10 New York City Law Firms.
Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York; George Venizelos, the Assistant Director in Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI); Raymond W. Kelly, the Commissioner of the Police Department for the City of New York (NYPD); and Patricia A. Menges, the Director of the New York Asylum Office of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), announced today the unsealing of nine indictments charging a total of 26 defendants with allegedly participating in separate but overlapping immigration fraud schemes related to the submission of hundreds of asylum applications containing fabricated claims of persecution. As alleged in the indictments, at least 10 New York City area law firms created and submitted these fraudulent applications on behalf of alien applicants and coached them on how to lie to immigration authorities. Of the 26 defendants charged, 21 work at the various law firms, six as attorneys. Also charged are four translators who work at an asylum office in Queens, New York; and an employee at a church in Queens where she allegedly provides training in basic Christianity to asylum applicants falsely claiming to have been persecuted in China for their religious beliefs. Twenty-one defendants were taken into custody late this morning and will be presented and arraigned this afternoon and tomorrow before United States Magistrate Judge Sarah Netburn. Of the remaining defendants, two will be surrendering tomorrow and three are at large. U.S. District Judges Ronnie Abrams, Robert P. Patterson, Sidney H. Stein, Victor Marrero, John G. Koeltl, and William H. Pauley, III have been assigned to these cases.
Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara stated, “Our asylum laws exist to provide a safe haven in the United States to immigrants subject to persecution in their own countries for exercising freedoms fundamental to a democracy. As alleged, these defendants, including six attorneys and a church employee, exploited those laws by weaving elaborate fictions on behalf of hundreds of would-be asylum seekers, coaching them on how to lie on their applications, stepping in when they went off script, and lying to immigration judges at court hearings. Asylum fraud imposes a tremendous burden on the system and it also makes it more difficult for those who are legitimately seeking refuge in this country.”
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