WA-Sham marriages: Federal Way woman sentenced for imm fraud
U.S. DISTRICT COURT
Sham marriages: Federal Way woman sentenced for immigration fraud
Published: 08/31/09 11:12 am | Updated: 08/31/09 12:40 pm
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A 35-year-old Federal Way woman was sentenced Monday in U.S. District Court in Seattle to thirty-three months in prison and three years of supervised release for three counts each of visa fraud and money laundering, conspiracy to commit those offenses and concealing an illegal alien.
Vuthy Sim was convicted January 23, 2009, following a twelve-day jury trial. The jury deliberated for one day before finding Sim guilty according to the press release from the U.S. Attorney General’s Office in Seattle.
At sentencing U.S. District Judge James L. Robart called the scheme "troublesome and serious," saying "The victims in this kind of visa fraud … are our community … our society, and the people who could not come here, whose spots were being taken by those engaging in the fraud."
According to testimony at trial and court documents, beginning in approximately June 2002, Sim recruited American citizens to participate in sham marriages with Cambodian nationals. The purpose of the fake marriages was for the Cambodian national to receive a visa to come to the United States and a "green card" to stay here.
In furtherance of the scheme, and as directed by Sim, the American citizen would travel to Cambodia and pose in staged engagement or wedding photos with a Cambodian national.
Sim typically would prepare the immigration paperwork and have the American citizen sign it, and then would submit the immigration paperwork to Citizenship and Immigration Services.
After the Cambodian national arrived in the United States, the Cambodian national and the American citizen would have a civil wedding ceremony, with Sim and members of her family typically acting as the witnesses at the wedding.
Sim would pay the American citizen $20,000 in exchange for that person’s participation in the scheme, with the money being paid over time, and the final payment not made until the Cambodian citizen was in the U.S. and had a green card.
Sim would pay the U.S. citizen with money that she received from the Cambodian national.
The evidence at trial showed that she profited in excess of $160,000.
The evidence at trial proved that Sim and her co-conspirators wired money from Cambodia to Sim’s bank accounts in this country.
She then used that money to pay the American co-conspirators for their participation in the fake marriages.
Sim also illegally concealed an illegal alien. The evidence showed that Sim sponsored her "mother" to come to the U.S., but the person who used the visa issued to her mother was, in fact, her sister.
According to a witness at trial, Sim’s sister has fled to Cambodia, rather than risk being arrested by immigration authorities.
In asking for a significant sentence, federal prosecutors wrote to the court that this type of fraud harms other immigrants. "Vuthy Sim showed a complete disregard for the immigration laws of the United States. By facilitating sham marriages, Vuthy Sim caused participants in her scheme to gain unfair advantages over those aliens who were lawfully and truthfully seeking U.S. visas," prosecutors wrote in their sentencing memo.
The case was investigated by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation Division (IRS-CID).
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