Raid Nets 7 Arrests in Bogus ID Ring

Standing beside a table piled high with faux Social Security cards and blank birth certificates, local police and federal agents on Thursday displayed evidence seized during a raid of a major document counterfeiting ring in Santa Ana.

Police collected typewriters, laminating machines and large, uncut sheets of counterfeit cards during a Tuesday raid that also netted the arrests of seven people accused of forging government papers.

Eight other suspects were taken into custody to await deportation proceedings, federal agents said.

Authorities said that the counterfeit operation, allegedly run out of a home in the 900 block of South Cypress Street, was capable of printing thousands of bogus documents each month.

Those phony papers, sold on street corners, allow illegal immigrants to find work and also provide career criminals with an opportunity to evade the law, said Richard Rogers, district director of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service.

“Southern California is the source of counterfeit documents throughout the United States,” said Rogers, whose agency worked with Santa Ana police on the raid. “These [fake documents] subvert all the systems we live by.”

Santa Ana is a well-known hub for fake document sales, and the curbside commerce frustrated local police who sought out federal assistance to track the supply back to its source, Police Chief Paul M. Walters said.

“With their assistance, we’ve closed down a significant operation,” Walters said Thursday.

Tuesday’s raid was part of an ongoing operation that began three months ago in Santa Ana, officials said.

Twenty-one people have been charged so far with possession or sales of phony government documents, according to INS Special Agent Robert H. Reed.