Moschorak to Leave INS This Month : Immigration: District director confirms his retirement but says it has nothing to do with allegations that he physically attacked a female subordinate.

Robert M. Moschorak, district director of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service in Los Angeles since November, 1989, will leave his powerful post at the end of this month, he confirmed Friday.

Moschorak said his decision to retire after 28 years in the INS has nothing to do with allegations that he physically attacked a female subordinate who reported him for attempting to expedite his wife’s citizenship application.

“I deny those allegations 100%,” Moschorak said in a brief telephone interview Friday. “This is a totally voluntary retirement.”

Discussions with top INS management during a recent trip to Washington did not influence his decision to step down, said Moschorak, who added that his superiors had instructed him not to discuss the allegations against him.

Verne Jervis, chief INS spokesman in Washington, described Moschorak’s departure as voluntary. “There’s been no force exerted on him to retire,” Jervis said.

There was no immediate word on who will succeed Moschorak as head of the Los Angeles district INS office, which has more than 1,000 employees and is one of the nation’s busiest. The Los Angeles headquarters serves a seven-county area that is a magnet for new immigrants from Latin America, Asia and elsewhere.

Rumors about Moschorak’s departure intensified after a top Justice Department watchdog publicly cited his alleged actions recently as an example of how INS management has failed to discipline wrongdoers.

Justice Department Inspector General Richard J. Hankinson told a House government operations subcommittee in Washington last month that internal investigators had substantiated an allegation that an unidentified INS district director had “physically intimidated” a staff member who reported him for using his influence to assist a family member.

Internal investigators concluded that the district director exhibited “possible poor judgment” in attempting to accelerate an immigration benefit for a relative, but no criminal wrongdoing was found, according to Hankinson’s statement to the congressional panel.

Although Hankinson mentioned no names, others later confirmed that the official cited was Moschorak and that the alleged victim was Jane E. Arellano, assistant INS district director for examinations, who is the top-ranking female INS official in Los Angeles.

Moschorak allegedly grabbed Arellano by the throat after learning that she reported him for allegedly attempting to expedite the citizenship application of his wife, according to a letter sent to INS management in Washington by Los Angeles Local 505 of the American Federation of Government Employees, the union representing agency workers.

The alleged assault occurred at INS headquarters in Los Angeles on June 8, 1990, said Robert L. Richardson, a Monterey Park attorney who represents Arellano. The attorney declined additional comment, other than to say the matter remains under investigation by the Office of Special Counsel, an independent federal oversight body that examines cases of alleged retribution against whistle-blowers.

Immigration officials are reviewing the allegations against Moschorak to determine if discipline is warranted, Jervis said. But Moschorak’s imminent departure would seem to make the disciplinary question moot.

Although the allegations only recently emerged publicly, talk about the alleged assault and misconduct has circulated extensively among INS workers, as have reports that Moschorak was on his way out.

In a letter this year to acting INS Commissioner Chris Sale, James Humble-Sanchez, president of the union local here, maintained that it would be “a disservice to the American public to allow Mr. Moschorak to retire with his . . . executive-level pension.”

The union is calling for a congressional investigation into why the INS never took action against Moschorak and instead permitted him to retire, Humble-Sanchez said.

It is unclear what happened to the citizenship case involving Moschorak’s wife. He has refused to discuss the situation, and such INS records are not public.