News Releases and Statements

A local resident, who stole the identity of his deceased nephew pleaded guilty and was sentenced Wednesday for falsely claiming to be a U.S. citizen and filing a false Social Security application. The case was investigated by U.S. ICE's Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).

Maria Azada, 53, of Grayslake, Ill., was arrested March 17 by ICE HSI agents and a Lake County State's Attorneys special investigator. Azada faces 17 felony counts in Lake County Circuit Court of perjury, mutilation of election materials, and tampering with voting machines in connection with illegal voting by a non-U.S. citizen.

A federal grand jury returned a 22-count indictment, which was unsealed Monday, charging three individuals - including a Florida driver's license examiner - in a counterfeit documents fraud scheme.

A federal grand jury in Chattanooga returned a two-count indictment on Tuesday against six individuals, including one Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) employee, for conspiring to unlawfully produce Tennessee driver's licenses.

True identity discovered when his employer submitted proposal for construction work on a Department of Homeland Security facility in Orlando

A federal grand jury indicted 13 people Tuesday in two related cash-for-food-stamp benefit fraud cases involving a total of more than a $580,000 in food stamps. The indictments resulted from an investigation conducted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Office of Inspector General, with assistance from U.S. ICE's Homeland Security...

U.S. District Judge Roger W. Titus, sentenced Brahim Lajqi, 51, an ethnic Albanian from Kosovo, residing in Silver Spring, Md., today to five years in prison followed by three years of supervised release for visa fraud.

A federal grand jury in Richmond has indicted 22 members of a fraudulent document trafficking organization based in Mexico with cells in 19 cities and 11 states, including three cells in Virginia. Discovered through an ongoing investigation dubbed Operation Phalanx, the organization is accused of kidnapping, beating and murdering competitors...

Syed Zaidi, 54, was sentenced today to 26 months in prison for his role in an immigration fraud conspiracy.

A Caldwell, Idaho, woman who operated an immigration consulting business was arrested Thursday for mail fraud and misuse of government seals following an investigation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.

Six individuals, including a former state employee, have been charged with conspiring to illegally produce and transfer identification documents, announced John W. Vaudreuil, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Wisconsin.

Majdi Juma, 29, Hikmat Juma, 38, and Nidal Juma, 40, owners and operators of the Super Corner Food Mart in Bradenton, Fla., were arrested and charged Thursday in federal court for conspiracy and various charges of fraud, including food stamp and wire fraud.

Three employees of a Reno-based immigration consulting firm were arrested Friday on state criminal charges following an investigation by the Nevada Attorney General's Office and U.S. ICE's HSI into allegations they orchestrated a multi-state scam that included impersonating employees of US CIS.

Following a lengthy investigation and successful sting operation Thursday, investigators with the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles' Compliance Enforcement Division and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) shut down a major false document factory and arrested four Reno residents on state charges.

Immigration attorney Parmesh N. Dixit, 40, of Alpharetta, Ga.,was indicted Tuesday by a federal grand jury on charges of visa fraud, alien harboring, and conspiracy, following an investigation by U.S. ICE's Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and the United States Department of Labor.

Fourteen individuals will make their initial appearance Friday morning in federal court here after being arrested by agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) on criminal charges related to an investigation into the manufacture and purchase of counterfeit identity and employment documents.

A Pawtucket, R.I., man was sentenced Friday in U.S. District Court in Providence for posing as an immigration attorney and claiming he was a federal immigration agent, threatening to have individuals deported. Audeliz Villegas, 45, pleaded guilty in federal court in June to four counts of wire fraud and one count of impersonating a federal agent.

Alexander Steele, 47, of Philadelphia, and Christopher J. Hahn, 48, of Edgewater, N.J., pleaded guilty Jan. 13 to charges in connection with a scheme that involved bribes to driver's license examiners in exchange for fraudulent driver's licenses.

Robert Fred Mejia, 29, of Germantown, Md., was sentenced to eight years in prison, for conspiring to impersonate a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer and to transport money obtained by fraud across state lines; transporting money obtained by fraud, in connection with a fraudulent scheme to provide immigration services...

A Los Angeles-area tax preparer, who was charged in a multi-faceted financial scheme that included making false claims to enable aliens to obtain religious worker visas, has pleaded guilty to tax and visa fraud charges.

The owner of a major Guam construction company has been charged in a 124-count indictment with a battery of federal violations for allegedly recruiting dozens of Chinese foreign nationals to come to Guam to work for his firm, then forcing them to labor long hours at substandard wages.