Amnesty Spurs ‘Cottage Industry’ in Bogus Papers

The new amnesty for illegal aliens has created a “burgeoning cottage industry” for new forms of counterfeit identification, ranging from false vehicle registrations to back-dated smog certificates, federal officials said Friday.

Immigration and Naturalization Service agents this week seized more than 150 counterfeit documents and arrested two major suppliers, one of them believed responsible for the sale of an estimated $500,000 a year in bogus documents, U.S. Atty. Robert Bonner announced at a Los Angeles press conference.

Among the documents seized were identification cards and other counterfeit documents that had been back-dated to 1982 or earlier in an apparent attempt to establish the five-year residency required for amnesty under the new immigration law.

“It appears that there are new types of counterfeit documents that are being generated for purposes of attempting to deceive the INS with regard to amnesty applications and to deceive employers into thinking people are here legally,” Bonner said.

While INS agents are trained to identify such counterfeit documents, a key target for the newly emerging kinds of false identification appears to be employers who must ascertain legal residency of their employees in order to avoid newly imposed sanctions, said Harold Ezell, INS Western regional commissioner.

“We want to encourage people that are eligible (for amnesty) to do it, but don’t use fraudulent means to get your status legalized,” Ezell said.

One of the operations broken up with Wednesday’s arrests was doing an estimated $500,000 in business a year, selling packets of false alien registration and Social Security cards to customers for $80 a pair.

While most of the documents seized by INS agents were false “green” cards and Social Security cards, federal agents also discovered equipment to make false birth certificates, vehicle registrations and smog certificates, Assistant U.S. Atty. Bonnie S. Klapper said.

Some had been dated prior to the Jan. 1, 1982, cutoff date for amnesty, and undercover agents who contracted to purchase the false documents were offered back-dating as an added service to make it appear as if they had resided in the country since before 1982, Klapper said.

The two cases in Los Angeles followed a similar arrest in March of a Chula Vista man who purportedly sold forged rent receipts to illegal aliens applying for amnesty. The receipts, back-dated to 1982, were sold for up to $3,150, authorities allege.

“The important thing is that as a result of the new law, people are no longer just making cards, they’re making them and pre-dating them,” Klapper said.

The arrests of Juan Manzo Mendez and Delfino Nava, who allegedly operated throughout the Los Angeles area, represent the beginning of a stepped-up enforcement effort in anticipation of a growing problem as the new immigration law takes effect, federal officials said.

“The trend in the use of counterfeit and bogus documents is disturbing because it does coincide with the filing of amnesty petitions, and it is particularly disturbing because it occurs within weeks of the time that employers in this country face sanctions for employing illegal aliens,” Bonner said. These sanctions take effect June 1.

Authorities believe that only about half the illegal aliens living in the Los Angeles area--variously estimated at between 1 million and 2 million--can legally qualify for amnesty.

“I think these two cases represent merely the tip of the iceberg,” Bonner said. “There is a burgeoning cottage industry out there in which very unscrupulous individuals are in the business of printing fraudulent documents.”

Mendez’s operation had been run out of the back of a camper for nearly nine years. His employees worked three shifts a day, 24 hours a day, and generated about $500,000 in business a year, Klapper said.

Nava was running a somewhat smaller operation out of his home in Paramount, authorities allege.

If convicted, both face maximum penalties of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Though they are potential targets of fraudulent identification documents, employers are only required to demonstrate a “good-faith” effort to verify legal residency in order to avoid penalties under the new law, INS officials said.

“To the untrained eye, these documents look real,” Ezell said. “The employer is not required to become an expert in documents.”

At the same time, however, employers should be alert for obvious discrepancies on identification cards, such as mismatched birthdates or photographs, he said.

INS officials said they can verify alien registration numbers on cards that appear questionable to an employer and the Social Security Administration has set up a similar verification service for employers.