Articles Posted in Immigration News

A past applications-adjudicator for the former U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) has been indicted by a Bay Area grand jury on nine criminal counts stemming from his alleged role in a marriage fraud scheme.

Andrew Chojecki, 61, a naturalized U.S. citizen who most recently resided in Poland, is charged in an indictment handed down Dec. 6 with conspiracy to commit marriage and visa fraud, marriage fraud, and alien harboring. The charges are the result of a two-year probe by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and its partner agencies on the San Francisco Document and Benefit Fraud Task Force, including U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service’s Fraud Detection and National Security Unit.

Six additional defendants are accused of conspiring with Chojecki to commit the fraud. They are; Beata Szkop, Malgorzata Zuk, Aaron Goldsmith, Pawel Karolak, Vito Scherma and Hector Vargas. The latter four defendants are also charged with alien harboring.

Following an investigation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), a Pennsylvania woman pleaded guilty Thursday to conspiracy to commit mail fraud.

Eleni Nguyen, 29, of Phoenixville, Pa., pleaded guilty in federal court to the charge in connection with filing false documents with the Pennsylvania Unemployment Compensation program. Nguyen is the third person charged in a scheme involving a temporary employment agency hiring illegal alien employees. Nguyen is the owner of the employment agency.

Andri Gunawan, a representative for the company, previously entered guilty pleas to various crimes, including conspiracy to transport illegal aliens, harboring illegal aliens and mail fraud. Both Gunawan and Nguyen are awaiting sentencing.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) Director Alejandro Mayorkas marked a significant milestone for the USCIS Entrepreneurs in Residence (EIR) initiative by launching an online resource center today at the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship in Cambridge, Mass. The resource center, Entrepreneur Pathways, provides entrepreneurs who seek to start a business in the United States an intuitive way to navigate the immigration process.

“Through our innovative Entrepreneurs in Residence initiative, we are working to realize our current immigration system’s full potential to attract and retain startup enterprises that promote innovation and spur job creation in America,” said Director Alejandro Mayorkas. “The first phase has already led to unique improvements in our programs and enabled us to better serve immigrant entrepreneurs.”

Launched earlier this year at an Information Summit in Silicon Valley, the EIR initiative draws on industry expertise to strengthen USCIS policies and practices critical to American economic growth. The team comprised startup business experts and USCIS immigration experts working collaboratively over a short period of time to streamline pathways for a range of existing nonimmigrant visa categories often used by entrepreneurs.

Eligible nationals of Haiti (and persons without nationality who last habitually resided in Haiti) who currently have Temporary Protected Status (TPS) must re-register for TPS by November 30, 2012. Failure to re-register by this deadline may result in the loss of your TPS status. If you re-register after November 30 2012, you must provide good reason you could not re-register on time such as hardship due to Hurricane Sandy.

Details and procedures for re-registering for TPS are provided on the USCIS website and in the Federal Register notice announcing the extension of TPS for Haiti.

TPS was originally designated for Haiti in January 2010 in response to a catastrophic earthquake that devastated that country. TPS was re-designated in May 2011 (effective July 2011). The current 18-month extension of TPS for Haiti will remain in effect through July 22, 2014.