A former Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) chief counsel pleaded guilty Feb. 15 for identity theft and wire fraud, which included stealing identities of aliens involved in removal proceedings.
Raphael Sanchez, a member of ICE’s Office of the Principal Legal Advisor, concocted the scheme to obtain loans, lines of credit, and make purchases using the aliens’ identities from October 2013 to October 2017.
“Sanchez admitted that he obtained personally identifiable information of the victim aliens by used ICE’s official computer database systems and by accessing their official, hard-copy immigration A-files, and then forged identification documents on his work computer, such as social security cards and Washington State driver’s licenses, in the victims’ names,” a press release from the Department of Justice (DOJ) said. Sanchez used the forged documents to open credit card and bank accounts in the names of aliens, which he controlled.”
According to DOJ, he went as far as to open utility accounts in aliens’ names to establish “proof of residence,” but he would use his personal address, and then would proceed to open credit lines and even online accounts with financial institutions.
“Sanchez further admitted that once the accounts were approved and opened he made charges or drew payments totaling more than $190,000 in the names of aliens to himself or entities that he controlled, often using PayPal and mobile point of sale devices from Amazon, Square, Venmo, and Coin to process fraudulent Internet transactions,” according to DOJ. “Sanchez also employed credit monitoring services on some of these aliens and corresponded with credit bureaus in the names of aliens to conceal his fraud scheme.”
Sanchez’s sentencing is scheduled for May 11.
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