Thread: PA: Officials Bust Bucks Co. Immigration Fraud Ring

Officials Bust Bucks Co. Immigration Fraud Ring
Ben Simmoneau PHILADELPHIA (CBS 3) ―

Federal Officials announced on Tuesday that they have busted and immigration fraud ring based out of Bucks County.

The U.S. Attorney charged six people with trying to get hundreds of immigrants legal status based on bogus claims.

David Linn, 33, reportedly posed a lawyer and charged immigrants $8,000 a piece and sometimes $12,000 for families on the guarantee he could grant them asylum; however, the asylum applications were filled with false claims.

Federal officials said the group made around $3 million telling asylum seekers how to lie to immigration officials.

Half a million dollars and two gold bars were seized from beneath the floor of David Linn's Bucks County home.

"This fraud was about nothing more than money. Their most important job was to coach illegal immigrants on how to lie," said acting U.S. Attorney, Laurie Magid.

The defendants reportedly coached the immigrants on how to lie to officials about persecution based on their religion or sexual orientation.

"What happened in this case is unfair to all those seeking entry into this country, who are in danger. Who do live in fear," said Magid.

Around 380 bogus applications were filed over four years and less than ten were approved.

Three of the defendants are already in custody and the other three are expected to turn themselves in sometime this week.
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Posted: Tuesday, 29 July 2008 11:17AM

Federal Authorities Charge 6 in Local Immigration Fraud Scheme



by KYW's Steve Tawa

A Bucks County man has been indicted for allegedly filing hundreds of fraudulent asylum applications for clients who wanted to immigrate to the United States.

Acting US attorney Laurie Magid (right) says phony lawyer David Lynn, 33, of Holland (Bucks County), Pa. and five other people raked in about $3 million in fees by running what she called "an immigration fraud mill."

Working out of offices in Bucks County and Northeast Philadelphia (top photo), she says, the group filed at least 380 bogus applications for asylum over a four year period.

Each applicant, she says, paid between $8,000 (for an individual) and $12,000 (for a family), yet in that time fewer than ten applications for asylum were approved by the US government.

Magid says Lynn and his four Russian-born co-defendants coached illegal immigrants -- most of them from Russia or other Eastern European countries -- on how to lie to authorities in order to obtain a green card.

She says the immigrants were told to falsely claim that they were victims of persecution in their home countries (for being, for example, a Baptist, or a Jehovah's Witness, or a gypsy, or a homosexual).


www.kyw1060.com

Philadelphia Illegal immigration ring busted
The Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA — A ring of Russian-born immigrants who live in the Philadelphia area made $3 million coaching asylum-seekers in how to lie to immigration officials, federal authorities charged Tuesday.

David Lynn, 33, advised at least 380 eastern European clients to claim they feared persecution based on religious, sexual orientation or other grounds, prosecutors said.

Lynn charged $8,000 per applicant or $10,000 to $12,000 per family, and took in so much cash he buried $560,000 and two 10-ounce gold bars in his basement floor, according to an indictment unsealed Tuesday.

Despite his seeming popularity within the Russian emigre community in Northeast Philadelphia and adjacent Bucks County, only a handful of his clients actually won asylum from 2003 to 2007.

“This fraud was about nothing more than money,â€

Courier Times
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Feds: Asylum seekers coached to lie

By BEN FINLEY AND MATT COUGHLIN
Bucks County Courier Times

NORTHAMPTON - They were Baptists with broken noses, Jews who'd been routinely abused and Jehovah's Witnesses whose homes had been firebombed.

Or so said nearly 400 Eastern Europeans who allegedly lied about being persecuted in their homelands to try to gain asylum and, eventually, residency in the United States.

At the center of the scheme was David Lynn, a 33-year-old Northampton man who was born in Israel and who himself has no legal status in the U.S., according to federal authorities.

During the mid-2000s, Lynn allegedly made $3 million off immigrants who paid him fees of $8,000 per person and up to $12,000 per family for help concocting fake stories of abuse and oppression.

But the overwhelming majority of the immigrants were denied asylum anyway because their stories weren't convincing enough or the immigrants lacked the proper documents, acting U.S. Attorney Laurie Magid said.

“This fraud was about nothing more than money,â€