lily
11-14-2006, 01:28 AM
Link (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/12/AR2006111201182.html?referrer=email)
Hunch Unravels Immigrant Wedding Scam
Odd Behavior at Arlington Courthouse Leads to Arrests in Probe of Green-Card
Marriages
By Jerry Markon
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, November 13, 2006; Page A01
They didn't hug. They didn't kiss. They didn't even sit together.
Many couples going to the Arlington County Courthouse seemed more like
strangers than people applying for marriage licenses. A man named Sam often
escorted them to the sixth-floor clerk's office. Sometimes, there would be a
furtive exchange of money in the elevator.
Before long, some of the same people would be back, filing for divorce,
their court papers littered with mistakes -- always the same mistakes.
"They misspelled 'circuit,' " said David A. Bell, the longtime Circuit Court
clerk. "It was obvious something was going on."
Bell tipped off police, triggering a nearly four-year investigation that
recently broke up one of the Washington region's biggest and most brazen
immigration scams: an estimated 1,000 fake marriages. The scheme was
centered in the area's little-noticed but rapidly growing community of
immigrants from Ghana.
For immigrants, marrying a U.S. citizen is a quick ticket to citizenship.
Along the East Coast and all the way to West Africa, at car dealerships,
malls, parties and even a Home Depot, the word had spread: If you are in the
United States illegally, go to Arlington. It's easy to get married in
Virginia, because marriage laws are relatively lax. Arlington, with its
proximity to the Metro system and the District, is especially convenient.
In recent weeks, 19 of 22 people charged so far in the undercover
investigation have pleaded guilty in federal court in Alexandria, including
bank tellers, car salesmen and health-care workers. Court testimony and
interviews document how Ghanaian immigrants married U.S. citizens they had
met the same day, then were coached on how to fool immigration inspectors,
usually months later, into believing that the marriage was real. All they
wanted, they said, was to stay in the United States.
Now, they will have to leave.
Caroline Chepkwony, who entered the United States in 1996 as an employee of
the Kenyan Embassy, sobbed on the witness stand recently as she told the
judge that she found a sham husband for the sake of her 3-year-old son.
"This is why I entered into this marriage, just hoping to give my son the
best life he can get," said Chepkwony, 36, as she pleaded guilty to marriage
fraud. "And I figured out the only place he can get a better life is here in
America."
Hunch Unravels Immigrant Wedding Scam
Odd Behavior at Arlington Courthouse Leads to Arrests in Probe of Green-Card
Marriages
By Jerry Markon
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, November 13, 2006; Page A01
They didn't hug. They didn't kiss. They didn't even sit together.
Many couples going to the Arlington County Courthouse seemed more like
strangers than people applying for marriage licenses. A man named Sam often
escorted them to the sixth-floor clerk's office. Sometimes, there would be a
furtive exchange of money in the elevator.
Before long, some of the same people would be back, filing for divorce,
their court papers littered with mistakes -- always the same mistakes.
"They misspelled 'circuit,' " said David A. Bell, the longtime Circuit Court
clerk. "It was obvious something was going on."
Bell tipped off police, triggering a nearly four-year investigation that
recently broke up one of the Washington region's biggest and most brazen
immigration scams: an estimated 1,000 fake marriages. The scheme was
centered in the area's little-noticed but rapidly growing community of
immigrants from Ghana.
For immigrants, marrying a U.S. citizen is a quick ticket to citizenship.
Along the East Coast and all the way to West Africa, at car dealerships,
malls, parties and even a Home Depot, the word had spread: If you are in the
United States illegally, go to Arlington. It's easy to get married in
Virginia, because marriage laws are relatively lax. Arlington, with its
proximity to the Metro system and the District, is especially convenient.
In recent weeks, 19 of 22 people charged so far in the undercover
investigation have pleaded guilty in federal court in Alexandria, including
bank tellers, car salesmen and health-care workers. Court testimony and
interviews document how Ghanaian immigrants married U.S. citizens they had
met the same day, then were coached on how to fool immigration inspectors,
usually months later, into believing that the marriage was real. All they
wanted, they said, was to stay in the United States.
Now, they will have to leave.
Caroline Chepkwony, who entered the United States in 1996 as an employee of
the Kenyan Embassy, sobbed on the witness stand recently as she told the
judge that she found a sham husband for the sake of her 3-year-old son.
"This is why I entered into this marriage, just hoping to give my son the
best life he can get," said Chepkwony, 36, as she pleaded guilty to marriage
fraud. "And I figured out the only place he can get a better life is here in
America."