Thread: charge South Boston man with making fake IDs for aliens

http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke/wb/wb/xp-88844
Police charge South Boston man with making fake IDs for aliens
An indictment said the man made at least 37 fraudulent documents, some of which he sold to illegal immigrants.
By Lindsey Nair
The Roanoke Times

A man living in South Boston has been accused of producing fake driver's licenses, Social Security cards and other identification documents.

Ricardo Reyes-Garcia, 29, was indicted on 53 felony counts Thursday by a federal grand jury sitting in Danville.

According to the indictment, Reyes-Garcia made at least 37 fraudulent documents, including permanent resident alien cards, which allow immigrants to live and work in the United States for up to 10 years.

He is also accused of selling fake Social Security cards and driver's licenses from Mexico, Costa Rica, Guatemala and North Carolina.

The indictment also charges Reyes-Garcia with possession of the templates or electronic devices used to make the documents, forging the Department of Justice seal and knowingly using a fake DOJ seal to create a fraudulent document.

The indictment lists a variety of names that appeared on the false documents, but it is unclear if those are the names of real people.

Heidi Coy, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Roanoke, said Reyes-Garcia is an illegal immigrant himself who was making the documents for profit, but she declined to say how much he may have netted in the scheme.

She said prosecutors are not yet sure where all of Reyes-Garcia's customers went with their documents after they had purchased them.

According to Gisela Pacho, an immigration counselor at Refugee and Immigration Services in Roanoke, immigrants who purchase such documents are victims themselves.

Pacho said she has heard of people being charged anywhere from $100 to $800 for such items.

"Unfortunately, out of desperation to do things correctly and have the right documents, they do fall prey to people like that," Pacho said. "And the problem is that later on down the road, if there is an immigration benefit that they can qualify to apply for, they have then used a false document, so it further complicates their life."

Reyes-Garcia is being held in the Blue Ridge Regional Jail. He is facing up to five years on each charge for a total maximum sentence of 265 years in prison.

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http://www.alipac.us/modules.php?name=F ... ic&t=45053

I cannot believe that anyone would call an illegal a victim. With all the information the Mexican government is providing them illegals know that documentation purchased off the street is fake.

Enough of this crying for illegals. The only crying that should be done is for the American taxpayer.