Thread: MN: Crash raises issues of fake IDs, immigration

Crash raises issues of fake IDs, immigration
There's a brisk trade in false documents in the state, spurring some legislators to call for crackdowns.
By JEAN HOPFENSPERGER, Star Tribune
Last update: February 22, 2008 - 11:02 PM

Questions about Alianiss Nunez Morales' identity don't surprise Minnesotans who work with immigrants, saying it points to a flourishing statewide trade in false documents.

It also points to the need to tighten sanctions for using fake documents and crack down on illegal immigration, argue some political leaders.

"To be honest, people can get false documents quickly and easily,'' said Sgt. Kevin Flynn, of the Worthington Police Department, which has experience with dubious documents. "It's basically just word of mouth. People can go out and buy a birth certificate and a Social Security card, and then ... obtain other forms of ID.''

A woman originally identified as Morales was charged in connection with the crash that killed four children on Tuesday near Cottonwood. Federal investigators said Friday they believe the woman is using an alias and is in the United States illegally.

A birth certificate and Social Security card are among documents that can be used to get a Minnesota ID, which the woman was carrying when her van collided with the school bus.

Police shouldn't be surprised that -- if they discover the ID is false -- there could be multiple "Alianiss Nunez Morales" around the country, said Uriel Perez Espinoza, vice president of UNITE HERE Local 17, which organizes restaurant and hotel workers.

"Someone may have sold an ID to her [Morales] and then to other people in other states,'' Espinoza said. "There are guys who are exploiting people. This is what happens when you live in the shadows.''

Feds 'ignored the problem'

Morales' identification indicated she was from Puerto Rico, which is one of the hot spots for bogus identification in Minnesota, said law enforcement officials. They say they are increasingly frustrated about the fake driver's licenses, green cards and other IDs showing up across the state.

"It's pretty clear the federal government has ignored the problem so long that it's become institutionalized,'' said Michael Campion, Minnesota public safety commissioner.

The Minnesota ID, which Morales was carrying, is a state-issued document that can be used in lieu of a driver's license for such things as writing checks or buying liquor.

More than 118,000 people were issued Minnesota IDs last year, according to the Department of Public Safety. The number of such IDs has grown steadily in the past three years.

Meanwhile, legislators calling for a crackdown on illegal immigration say the Cottonwood crash underscores the need for several bills to pass the Legislature. They include a bill that would increase penalties for using false IDs and one tightening requirements for obtaining driver's licenses

"This is a tragic accident: I think we need to mourn a bit here,'' said Sen. Joe Gimse, R-Willmar, an author of those bills. "But I'm hopeful this will help to raise awareness of the issues we're working on.''

However, some immigrants' advocates argue that the crash shows that Minnesota should follow the lead of several other states that allow illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses. That way they would have the same background as other drivers.

In his blog on the Marshall Independent's website, editor Dana Yost wrote Friday: "We've gotten e-mails and phone calls from around the country, most of them angry and demanding that someone do something about the woman. ...

"I told one e-mailer that far more people are killed by drunken drivers in Minnesota than by illegal-immigrant drivers. If we devoted as much energy to keeping drunks off the road as many are howling now about illegals, that might be a little more productive."

Jean Hopfensperger • 651-298-1553
http://www.startribune.com/local/15895472.html

Van driver's real identity a mystery
BY JOHN BREWER
Pioneer Press
Article Last Updated: 02/22/2008 11:31:53 PM CST


This photo, supplied by the Lyon County Sheriff's Office, shows Alianiss N. Morales of Minneota, Minn., the driver of a van that struck a school bus in rural Minnesota Tuesday, Feb. 19, who has been arrested on suspicion of criminal vehicular operation. Four students were killed in the mishap.(AP Photo/Lyon County Sheriff's Office via the Marshall Independent)

Who is Alianiss Nunez Morales?

According to U.S. immigration officials, not the same woman who crashed her van into a bus Tuesday and killed four students near Cottonwood, Minn.

Tim Counts, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman, said agency investigators believe the woman was in the United States illegally and not using her true identity.

So far, her immigration status is up in the air. She must appear before an immigration judge for a final determination, but that can't happen until her trial and any sentence in the bus crash case are finished.

That doesn't mean authorities aren't trying to build a case against her in the meantime.

ICE officials found a listing for an Alianiss N. Morales in Puerto Rico and presented a photo of the van driver to the real Morales' grandparents. They said they didn't recognize the woman pictured.

Counts said the van driver told investigators she was from Mexico, but little else.

"She was minimally helpful to our agents," he said.

The name Alianiss N. Morales has turned up in public records across southwest Minnesota. Twenty-three-year-old Morales:

-- Was ticketed for a traffic incident in Montevideo in May 2006.

-- Lived in Montevideo in 2006, according to a state ID card in her name.

-- Worked at Jennie-O Turkey Store in Willmar in late 2007, according to the company.

-- Worked at Norcraft Cabinetry in Cottonwood, according to her own testimony.

-- Lived in a Minneota mobile home, according to her and neighbors.

On Friday, a Minneota squad car barred reporters from knocking on the door of mobile home No. 4 in Van's Trailer Park, where neighbors said the woman had moved a couple of weeks ago.

"I've seen her a couple of times," Mackenzie Kraus said. "She kept quiet."

Another neighbor said she heard the woman lived with a boyfriend, but she had never seen him.

Pete Van Vooren, owner of the 26-home park, said the woman was subletting her trailer from a Cottonwood resident.

"My understanding was that she had a husband or a boyfriend or something," he said. "I didn't even know the name of the people living there until all this happened."

She also is reported to have lived in Cottonwood.

A spokesman for Norcraft in Cottonwood did not confirm or deny that an Alianiss Morales worked in the cabinetry plant.

A May 2006 traffic ticket issued to an Alianiss Morales in Montevideo describes a woman who "looks like she does not know how to drive" maneuvering through a lawn. An officer issued her a ticket for not having a driver's license.

At her first court appearance Friday in Lyon County, the van driver talked of having family in the region, including an aunt.

Her attorney, Manuel Guerrero, of St. Paul, said he had been retained by the van driver's sister.

Immigration officials would not say whether they had talked to any of the van driver's relatives.

An acquaintance from Jennie-O said the woman he worked with was nice, friendly and religious.

"I only know her as Alianiss," said Carlos Hiraldo, of Montevideo.

John Brewer can be reached at 651-228-2093 or at jbrewer@pioneerpress.com.
http://www.twincities.com/ci_8339968

Who is the other Alianiss Nunez Morales?
by Laura Yuen, Minnesota Public Radio,
Ambar Espinoza, Minnesota Public Radio
February 23, 2008

Authorities say the woman charged with killing four children in a fatal bus crash is living in the country illegally and using someone else's identity. They did not identify the other Alianiss Nunez Morales. But documents indicate there's a woman in Connecticut of the same age with the same uncommon name. She's apparently from Puerto Rico, a leading source of stolen identities.

St. Paul, Minn. — A public records search turned up a 23-year-old woman named Alianiss Nunez Morales in Chester, Connecticut. The records indicate her Social Security card was issued in Puerto Rico.

Alianiss is not a common name. Two Spanish linguistics professors contacted for this story say they've never heard of it. They say it could be a name created by parents.

Friday the prosecutor in the Cottonwood case said immigration officials went to Puerto Rico to talk to the grandmother of a person named Alianiss Nunez Morales. They showed her a mug shot of the woman now sitting in the Lyon County jail.

"He showed me an ID with the picture of a dark woman with dark eyes," says the grandmother, Alejandrina Correra. "And he asked me if that was Alianiss, and I said, 'No, that's not Alianiss. Alianiss is blonde with green eyes.'"

Correra told Minnesota Public Radio she raised Alianiss from the age of 1 after her parents died. Correra doesn't know where her granddaughter lives in the United States, only that she moved to this country with her two daughters and a friend. She doesn't know her granddaughter's phone number and doesn't have a way to make contact.

He showed me an ID with the picture of a dark woman with dark eyes, and he asked me if that was Alianiss, and I said, 'No, that's not Alianiss. Alianiss is blonde with green eyes.'"
- Alejandrina Correra of Puerto Rico, grandmother of a woman named Alianiss Nunez MoralesThe grandmother said the investigator who came to her door said Alianiss had apparently lost some documents and that another person used them.

The Web site MySpace has a page belonging to an Alianiss Nunez who lives in the same Connecticut town, Chester. She lists her age as 23 and describes herself as a single mom from Puerto Rico who likes soap operas.

In photographs, the woman partially fits the grandmother's description. Her eyes are green, but her hair is brown, not blond. The page is decorated with pink fairies. This Alianiss says she wants to give her two children opportunities she never had.

We received no response to several emails to the MySpace account. Outside of Puerto Rico, there is no working listed phone number for Alianiss Morales in the U.S.

Authorities won't say if there's any link between the Alianiss in Connecticut and the woman who drove a mini-van into the school bus in southwestern Minnesota on Tuesday.

That woman told officers she lives in a Minneota trailer and is originally from Mexico. She was driving without a license. Authorities say she has been uncooperative in revealing her true identity.

Immigration officials haven't said for sure whether this is a case of identity theft. But Puerto Rico is a big source of fake documents for illegal immigrants in the United States.

Tim Counts with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement wouldn't give any specifics on the Morales case. But he did say identities from Puerto Rico are highly sought in the underground identity trade.

"Many times illegal aliens will assume the identity of a Puerto Rican U.S. citizen because of the commonality in the language and will use that identity. It's difficult to say exactly how it happens, how those identities are channeled here, but we do find that's a fairly common occurrence," he says.

In 2006, a Worthington man was indicted on charges that he was selling Puerto Rican birth certificates and Social Security cards to illegal immigrants in search of work.

Authorities say sometimes the identities are stolen. In other cases, the true owners of the identities will sell their documentation for a few hundred dollars to illegal immigrants or document dealers.

"The reason Puerto Rican birth certificates are so valued in the community is that enables the person to claim they're a United States citizen," says Mark Cangemi, a former ICE special agent who now works as an attorney focusing on immigration issues. He says illegal immigrants can buy packets of Puerto Rican documents that he calls "legitimate paper."

"And what I mean by that are legitimate Puerto Rican birth certificates that have the appropriate biographical data, with a supporting Social Security number issued to that individual. These packets were being sent to Worthington and other areas in that part of the state and being sold for upwards of $1,700 a package," Cangemi says.

Speaking generally about stolen-identity cases, Cangemi says officials must thoroughly investigate a suspect's background. He says while all of a suspect's documents may be consistent with one another, it still doesn't prove that's the person's true identity.

Investigators will ask where someone went to school, and for parents' names, and will interview neighbors. Then they'll compare what they've learned to information in federal government databases.

"There's a lot of information that can be verified, and with some effort, you can determine whether the person is the rightful holder of that identity. Or if not, you can establish that that is not the person to whom the identity was issued. But it still does not tell you who that person is," Cangemi says.

Investigators apparently will need to consider the possibility there are two women who share the name of Alianiss Nunez Morales--one in Connecticut, and one in the Lyon County jail.
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/displa ... /identity/

Who was the van registered too.
There has to bee more people charged.

However, some immigrants' advocates argue that the crash shows that Minnesota should follow the lead of several other states that allow illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses. That way they would have the same background as other drivers.

How would that help if the driver's license is obtained with fraudlent documents?

Her attorney, Manuel Guerrero, of St. Paul, said he had been retained by the van driver's sister.

Her idenity should be known now.

Did she own the van and have insurance?

She should be charged with obstruction of justice for not co-operating with authorities.

"We enforce our laws, and we defend law-abiding citizens. And we reserve the benefits of citizenship for legal residents."
Matt Blunt Governor of Missouri

Investigation into background of driver of van continues

By Dana Yost

COTTONWOOD — The woman charged in Tuesday’s deadly Lakeview School bus crash is an illegal immigrant using a fake name, authorities said Friday at a news conference in Cottonwood.

Authorities also do not know the woman’s real identity, but said they would “get to the bottom of the matter.â€

Van driver involved in Cottonwood crash charged; officials say she is an illegal immigrant

By Rae Kruger


MARSHALL — In what she said was her first trip on Lyon County Road 24, a woman who authorities say did not have a valid driver’s license and was using a false identity caused a crash that killed four children, a court complaint alleges.
The 23-year-old Minneota woman, who identified herself as Alianiss Nunes Morales, was charged in Lyon County District Court on Friday on four counts of criminal vehicular homicide and lesser charges of stop sign violation and no Minnesota driver’s license. Officials also said she is an illegal immigrant and has assumed the identity of the real Alianiss Nunes Morales.
“There was a stop sign, and all the evidence and reports I have is the driver didn’t stop — she ran the stop sign,â€

However, some immigrants' advocates argue that the crash shows that Minnesota should follow the lead of several other states that allow illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses. That way they would have the same background as other drivers.

I don't think so. Advocates assume illegal aliens will give their true names, know how to drive and pay for insurance. They won't.