Thread: CO: Huge immigration raid in Weld County is still going

When over 27% of your clients are using fake SSN's you have to know something is up

Originally Posted by jean

When it was time to file taxes, most of the 1,369 people got refunds by using the earned income tax credit and child care deductions.

So much for "Legalize them and collect taxes".

THEY DON'T PAY TAXES, WE PAY THEM!!

I am going to bookmark this article and send it to every moron who utters the "legalize them" phrase.

[quote="butterbean"][quote]On Thursday, one local Latino businessman called the investigation into Amalia’s Tax Service “racial profilingâ€

Keep the pressure on em news!!!!! Please get these blood suckers off our backs!!!!

Federal policies a hindrance to enforcing immigration law

November 14, 2008

Andrew Villegas,
If there’s one conclusion a cursory examination of Weld County’s latest immigration bust brings, it’s that we’re a country and county conflicted.

The federal government is admittedly torn between enforcing its immigration laws and a desire for the tax revenue illegal immigrants pay while in the United States — not to mention the spending they do here.

Businesses want cheap labor for their agricultural operations but don’t want to harm Americans looking for work. There are more than 10 million people unemployed in the United States and at least that many in the U.S. illegally.

It’s not difficult to see that competing interests and a political stalemate have led to a breaking — both literally and figuratively — of the law.

How it works

The Internal Revenue Service gives illegal immigrants Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers — called an ITIN — when they don’t have a Social Security number but still are required by law to file a tax return. It’s how illegal immigrants, and legal immigrants who aren’t eligible for Social Security numbers, pay taxes. It’s also how they get tax refunds from the government — even if they aren’t here legally, which sometimes adds up to thousands of dollars for each of them.

In this case, illegal immigrants who bought stolen Social Security numbers took tax forms they received from their employers — with the stolen name and Social Security Number — to Amalia Cerrillo, who prepared their tax forms for them. Cerrillo — who has not been charged with a crime, and was cleared of wrongdoing by the Colorado Department of Revenue — would request an ITIN from the government using the illegal immigrant’s real name. She’d then cross out the stolen name and Social Security number and put the person’s real name on the form. By law, a person cannot have both a Social Security number and an ITIN.

Bruce Lichtenberger, a certified public accountant in Greeley, said that if someone asked him to prepare taxes with a stolen Social Security number and name that he wouldn’t do it.

“Generally, we wouldn’t touch it,â€

Originally Posted by AirborneSapper7

Investigators examined 5,000 of Amalia Cerillo's clients and 1,369 of them were found to have stolen or phony Social Security numbers.

thieves stealing from thieves that are stealing from the IRS that steals from the Middle Class Tax Payer... How dam efficient is that ..

boy is there someway I can get in on this ... sounds too good to be true

I've got to tell you Airborne, you don't know how many times my husband has sat here contemplating similar thoughts.

He is the victim of identity theft perpetrated by an illegal alien who found it convenient due to the hispanic surname and which was discovered by the SSA after my husband became ill and we began applying for his benefits.

To make a long story short, this has snowballed into one problem after another, my husband has been unable to collect his disability, and a 20 year airborne Ranger he cannot even get anything from the VA all because of the insistence that he is happily living and working in CA.

You don't know how tempted he has been.....watching this family suffer for absolute no valid reason whatsoever......to pretend to be an illegal alien for the sake of getting his hands on enough for us to survive without struggling like we do.

Of course he hasn't ever done anything toward that end, but it has crossed his mind and I think your post opens a discussion beyond the usual rhetorical discussions we find ourselves having.

You really have to wonder, how many people have had the same thoughts? How desperate would one have to be to actually do something like that? Are people going to become that desperate as conditions worsen? If obama grants the big amnesty he's promised?

Are Americans, especially those of Hispanic, Asian. or Indian descent and who are fluent in the languages, going to become so desperate to save their families and themselves that they will have no qualms whatsoever about "turning in to" illegal aliens?

Any thoughts on that subject, anyone?

Tax sweep could affect thousands of immigrants
The Associated Press
2008-11-16

GREELEY, Colo. -
An immigrant's tax scam in Weld County has launched a sweeping investigation authorities say could yield 1,300 arrests over the next year - a crackdown some complain is a backhanded attempt to oust immigrants.

The Weld County District Attorney, Ken Buck, says authorities have traced some $2.6 million in payments by the IRS to illegal immigrants using phony Social Security numbers.

The filings were traced to Amalia's Translation and Tax Services in Greeley, where investigators last summer started searching for examples of identity theft.

The probe started after a Texas man discovered someone in northern Colorado was using his Social Security number to get IRS refunds. Servando Trejo, who worked at a Kersey feed lot, was arrested and charged with identity theft.

The tax preparer, Amalia Cerrillo, told authorities that Trejo and other immigrants came in with phony Social Security numbers, launching an identity theft investigation Buck described as "overwhelming," with thousands of records seized and about 1,300 arrests expected through 2009.

But the identity theft crackdown smacks of anti-immigrant persecution, according to some immigrant advocates in Greeley. They say they're reminded of immigration raids two years ago at a Swift & Co. meatpacking plant.

"The solution is not rounding up people in police raids like Swift or little tax services that serve Latinos," said Kimberly Baker-Medina, a Fort Collins immigration attorney. "The solution is passing some sort of immigration reform."

Weld authorities defend the probe, which they've dubbed Operation Number Games. They say tax fraud is the target, not immigrants.

"If you break the law, you pay the consequences," Greeley Mayor Ed Clark told the Greeley Tribune.

But Jeff Joseph, a Denver immigration attorney, told the newspaper that he suspects the tax investigation is suspiciously timed.

Joseph pointed out that federal courts are divided on how to interpret when identity theft becomes a federal crime, and so the Weld County officials may be trying to see immigrant tax scofflaws deported before a possible Supreme Court decision on the question.

"In the meantime, Ken Buck, right out of the chute is racing to get these convictions in before the Supreme Court rules on the issue," Joseph said. "These people will be long gone by then. They will have pled guilty to crimes they never should have pled to in the first place."

Already at least 15 people in Weld County have been arrested in Operation Number Games. Authorities said arrests would continue through the weekend and likely into 2009, with up to 1,300 arrests possible.

So far, the tax preparer has not been charged with a crime. But immigration advocates say the immigrants themselves are unlikely to understand complicated tax schemes, so they probably relied on the tax preparer when filling out forms.

"They should be investigating that rather than splitting apart 1,300 families, especially when they know the charges are questionable in the first place," Joseph said.

www.examiner.com

Notice how these open border types are (predictably) trying to change the topic and divert attention from the real issue, which is rampant identity theft committed by large numbers of illegal aliens that calls for even more enforcement on many levels.

Operation Number Games arrests slow down as suspects apparently leave town

December 2, 2008

Mike Peters

A recent sweep of illegal immigrants suspected in identifty thefts may not be progressing as quickly as hoped because the suspects are leaving town.

Thirty-one people have now been arrested in Operation Number Games, the identity theft sweep coordinated by the Weld County Sheriff’s Office and the Weld District Attorney’s Office.

Three weeks ago, the law agencies launched the sweep, which they said involves as many as 1,300 illegal aliens who have been living in northern Colorado and using false or stolen Social Security numbers and identities.

While at news conferences, officials said they hoped to arrest about 25 people a week; but in three weeks, there have been 31 arrests.

According to Weld County Sheriff John Cooke, at least part of the reason for the fewer arrests are that the likely suspects have left town.

www.greeleytribune.com

These "latino activists" are full of BS. Illegal aliens are stealing the SS #'s from American citizens with hispanic surnames. Why are they only concerned with the criminals and care nothing for the victims?

» At Amalia’s Translation and Tax Services, the owner would use the alien’s stolen Social Security number under a phony name, secure a legal tax identification number, then fill out forms, which would result in a large tax return.

She knowingly participated in FRAUD since she knew the SS numbers were fake or stolen and they gave her their ITIN numbers (given to illegal aliens). If she was "following the law", why did she disregard the law that says you cannot have both a SS # and an ITIN?

These ITINs must be eliminated.