Husband of Suspended INS Examiner Indicted in Plot

The husband of a government immigration examiner was indicted Thursday for conspiring with his wife to take bribes in exchange for approving permanent U.S. residency for Taiwanese aliens posing as Buddhist monks and nuns.

Robert Anaya, 48, of Pasadena, a former criminal investigator with the Immigration and Naturalization Service, was added to the 31-count federal indictment issued in Los Angeles on April 1 against his wife, Dorothy. He was ordered held in lieu of $100,000 bail by U.S. Magistrate Joseph Reichmann, pending arraignment Monday.

Dorothy Anaya, 38, pleaded innocent and will stand trial May 27 before U.S. District Judge Stephen Wilson. She is free on bail. Dorothy Anaya, a 15-year INS employee, was suspended from her job as an immigration examiner in the Los Angeles branch when she was arrested by investigators from the INS Office of Professional Responsibilities, in a continuing investigation of immigration fraud in the INS office here.

Also named in the indictment was Alfred Lin, 50, of Northridge, Robert Anaya’s partner in an import business, Assistant U.S. Atty. James Berliner said.

The indictment said that Lin, believed to be in Taiwan, charged as much as $40,000 to obtain permanent residency documents for dozens of Taiwanese, then passed an undisclosed sum of money to the Anayas for Dorothy Anaya’s approval of the applications. Lin advised the aliens to claim on their applications that they were Buddhist clergy in an attempt to exploit a loophole in the law granting residency to foreign clergy members promised positions in the United States.

Four other people were indicted Wednesday for allegedly taking money for helping Taiwanese fraudulently obtain citizenship.

Federal indictments named Evelyn Clark, Marietta Jones, Betty Alvarez and Georgia Terrell in seven counts. Prosecutors said that only Terrell, a clerk, still works for the INS. Alvarez, a naturalization examiner, resigned Tuesday.

The government accuses Jones, an INS clerk in 1980, with falsely representing that the aliens named in the naturalization petitions were entitled to citizenship. A similar scheme in 1982 is alleged against Terrell and Alvarez.