Immigrant Activist Wants Fraud Unit

After a mother-daughter team pleaded guilty recently to posing as immigration agents and defrauding more than 100 families, a Latino activist is calling on the Orange County district attorney to form a task force for just such cases.

“This is nickel-and-dime stuff but it’s repeated enough to warrant the district attorney’s constant review,” said Nativo Lopez, co-director of Hermandad Mexicana Nacional.

Rosalva Jurado, 52, and her daughter, Norma Lillian Perez, 31, both of Fontana, pleaded guilty Monday to fraud, theft by false pretenses and conspiracy.

The two posed as Immigration and Naturalization Service agents at a Stanton trailer park, where they promised residents they would get them residency cards by giving them special treatment in the federal agency’s daunting bureaucracy. They collected $105,000 from their victims.

“We just wanted hope and sometimes you pay anything for hope,” said Maria Martinez, who came to the United States from Mexico, and is a 34-year-old mother of three children. She gave Jurado $3,000.

Lopez and others said immigration fraud is rampant because victims, mostly undocumented workers, are afraid to come forward and report it.

Without a specialized unit that works with nonprofit community-based organizations, the district attorney’s office will be unable to penetrate the problem, Lopez said.

Lopez said Orange County should copy the efforts of Los Angeles County, which established such a task force five years ago. The force has completed four arrest campaigns against immigration consultants who operate without required bonds. The sweeps led to charges of 55 misdemeanors and felonies.

Tori Richards, spokeswoman for the Orange County district attorney’s office, said the department might be facing budget cuts that would make it difficult to dedicate resources to specialized prosecution. However, she said, the district attorney is addressing complaints in the Stanton case and completed investigative work often done by police.

In addition, immigrants can attend meetings of a Hispanic commission formed by the district attorney’s office to address immigration fraud, Richards said.

The Stanton case was brought to the attention of the district attorney by Lopez at a forum during the campaign for district attorney.

Los Angeles’ task force has gotten mixed reviews.

It does bring immigration fraud into the spotlight. Kathleen Tuttle, Los Angeles County deputy district attorney, said the task force shows, “We want to prosecute their cases. We say we don’t care about their immigration status.”

But many said the problem is bigger than the task force’s domain. The force’s occasional sweeps have not rid Los Angeles of repeat offenders, said Los Angeles immigration attorney Alan Diamante, co-chairman of Committees Against Unauthorized Practice for two bar associations.

“There are so many people out there defrauding other folks that it appears [there is] more out there than the task force can do,” he said.