Swindlers Rip Off Immigrants Seeking Papers

Carlos Martinez thought he’d found the woman of his dreams: a notario who promised that for $2,000 she could get him political asylum status so he could remain here legally.

The 33-year-old illegal immigrant from Peru jumped at the offer. He paid $600 up front and carried the balance to her North Bergen, N.J., notary public office to seal the deal.

But the notario, the name for a legal counselor in Spanish, was gone--one step ahead of federal agents who greeted Martinez and about 20 other illegal aliens taken in by the same scam.

“I trusted her,” said Martinez, who is working as a doorman in Queens while now pursuing his asylum claim through a lawyer. “I was desperate.”

Such tales are repeated with increasing frequency around the New York area’s working-class neighborhoods, where con artists promising official papers or peddling forgeries, empty the pockets and dash the dreams of illegal aliens, victims and authorities say.

Although the scams are decades old, several factors have apparently boosted the trade: increased illegal immigration, a tighter job market and stricter federal labor laws since 1986 demanding proof of citizenship or work status.

Thousands of dollars can be paid to unlicensed “counselors” offering green cards, work papers, Social Security cards or other documents to back up false claims that the individual arrived before 1982--the cutoff for an amnesty program that granted illegal immigrants residency status. Some produce fake documents; some just take the money and run.

Like Martinez, other illegal aliens use unlicensed agents to file for political asylum, based on a claim that they face persecution in their homeland if they are forced to return.

Investigators say the unlicensed operators sometimes lure clients by promising that they have inside contacts in the government. But they often file no papers or submit asylum claims that don’t have the proper documentation.

Nearly all the scam victims are illegal immigrants who entered the country on tourist visas, officials say.

No accurate figures are available on the number of people duped, but activists and officials say dozens of deals are made each day. The New York office of the Immigration and Naturalization Service has 88 active fraud investigations.

“These scams are on the rise and are really a major industry, accounting for millions of dollars,” said Elizabeth Aivars, director of the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, whose anti-fraud task force is preparing a pamphlet to educate immigrants about the scams.

The New York area--with an estimated one-fifth of the nation’s illegal aliens--offers a window into similar cons in other areas such as Los Angeles, Texas and south Florida, investigators say.

“Wherever there are illegal aliens there are people dealing in illegal documents,” said Karen Kaminsky, who coordinates the anti-fraud task force.

But nabbing the swindlers is often difficult, officials say.

Few illegal immigrants are willing to file formal complaints, fearing deportation. Also, the scam operators often change names or flee the country at the first hint of pressure from authorities.

“It’s the perfect atmosphere for fraud,” said Aivars.

In Queens’ “Little Colombia,” Gloria Alvarez shook her finger at a storefront--now a grocery store.

“This used to be a travel agency. The man inside told me he could get me a green card,” said the 27-year-old Colombian, who asked that her maiden name be used. A green card gives aliens nearly all rights of citizenship except the ability to vote.

“I paid $500. That’s all I had,” she said. “Then one day the store just closed. I only knew the man’s first name--Carlos. That’s it.”

She paused as an elevated train rumbled by. “I, I don’t. . . . “ And she began to cry.

Alvarez claimed that she thought it was legal to have the man file the papers. But officials say some scams are done with the immigrant’s cooperation, particularly false amnesty claims.

“We’ve had people back-dating documents--then notarizing them themselves--to try to show people qualified for amnesty,” said John Gershkoff, head of the INS investigation unit in Newark, N.J. “The immigrants know what’s gone on.”

In Passaic County, N.J., one of the centers for the scam operators, Gershkoff said investigators recently closed a video store dealing in forged amnesty documents.

“There was a line out front,” he said. “Rent a video, get a document.”

In May, INS agents arrested six people in Brooklyn on charges of selling fake green cards and other documents to more than 2,000 illegal Polish immigrants, who paid between $50 and $100. If convicted, the suspects could face up to five years in prison.

“It’s a real black market across New York and across the nation,” said Mimi Fei, coordinator of the New York Immigrant Hotline, which has received about 100 fraud complaints in the last 18 months.

Fei flipped through her files. “Here’s $1,700, $4,000, $1,600, $1,000, $3,000. And these are just the people who call. Fifty people can be conned by the same practitioners saying he can produce papers or has an INS insider.”

“The people who lost hundreds of dollars are the lucky ones,” she said.