Thread: ALIPAC: Ex-UNCC staffer is tied to visa fraud

Ex-UNCC staffer is tied to visa fraud

Feds accuse fired employee of falsely reporting foreigners' student status.
By Eric Frazier
efrazier@charlotteobserver.com
Posted: Friday, Jul. 15, 2011

Federal prosecutors on Thursday accused a former UNC Charlotte employee of falsifying student visa information to help about 66 foreign nationals stay in the United States illegally.

Prosecutors say Thomas C. Briggs, who was an administrative support specialist in the school's Office of International Programs, entered false information in a database federal homeland security officials use to keep track of foreign students. They say he did so to harbor and conceal students who were staying in the U.S. illegally.

Court papers say Briggs committed the violations from around January 2007 to about June 2009. UNCC spokesman John Bland said the school discovered the problem and alerted federal authorities.

Briggs was terminated by the university in June 2009, Bland said.

Briggs couldn't be reached for comment.

Students in the country under student visas are required to be full-time students at a college or university. Prosecutors say Briggs, who served as an immigration resource for foreign students at UNCC, entered information in the database falsely stating that about 66 students were properly enrolled and maintaining a full course of study.

"Defendant Briggs then knew this information to be false," U.S. Attorney Anne Tompkins and Assistant U.S. Attorney Craig Randall said in the charge filed in federal court in Charlotte.

The court documents filed Thursday didn't indicate any of the students' profiles raised national security concerns, but the integrity of the student visa system has been a hot topic since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Some of the hijackers had been granted student visas.

It remains a concern for some: A bill was introduced in Congress earlier this year calling for improved background checks for student visa applicants from high-risk areas. Seven U.S. senators urged the Obama administration to crack down on student visa fraud, fearing terrorists might exploit it to get into the country.

They cited federal statistics showing more than 10,000 schools are approved to accept foreign students.

In January, a California pastor was sentenced to a year in prison for taking money from students for helping them get documentation for student visas, even though they never took classes at his religious university.

Last year, more than 80 people were arrested in connection with a Florida language school accused of using fraudulent student visas to help residents of more than a dozen countries enter the U.S. illegally.

Charlotte immigration lawyer Cynthia Aziz said while there have been cases of fraud, the student visas are highly regulated and hard to get. She called the UNCC allegations "very surprising" considering the level of federal oversight and what she sees as the university's meticulousness about student immigration matters.

"When I hear of a student that's been identified (as not being in school), they are very quickly picked up by immigration authorities," Aziz said.

William Gheen, president of the Raleigh-based Americans for Legal Immigration, sees it differently. He called the case another example of lax federal enforcement of immigration laws.

"It shouldn't have been up to just one employee at a university to say whether those students could stay. There should have been more checks and balances," he said.

Staff researcher Maria David contributed.

Read more: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2011/0 ... z1SBFyFv7g

I just got off the air on WBT radio in Charlotte, NC. Folks there are pretty upset about this scandal.

W

Charlotte immigration lawyer Cynthia Aziz said while there have been cases of fraud, the student visas are highly regulated and hard to get. She called the UNCC allegations "very surprising" considering the level of federal oversight and what she sees as the university's meticulousness about student immigration matters.

"When I hear of a student that's been identified (as not being in school), they are very quickly picked up by immigration authorities," Aziz said.

What a load of

That is upsetting.

UNC Charlotte
www.uncc.edu/
The University of North Carolina at Charlotte
9201 University City Blvd., Charlotte, NC 28223-0001 · 704-687-UNCC (8622)
Contatc Us - by e-mail @ https://www.uncc.edu/contact

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