Fake drivers license operation part of a larger ring?
Prosecutor says illegal immigrants were coming from across South Florida
By Jane Musgrave | The Palm Beach Post
5:53 PM EDT, June 5, 2009

DELRAY BEACH - The parking lot of the driver's license bureau in Delray Beach was constantly jammed with van loads of people arriving daily.

While harried employees didn't think much about the onslaught, some couldn't help but notice that a few of their co-workers had begun sporting wildly expensive designer purses and were driving cars -- BMWs and Infiniti SUVs -- that seemed to far exceed the stretch of their modest paychecks.

The two seemingly unrelated events were tied together late last month when a multi-agency task force arrested five license examiners for accepting bribes to issue driving permits to hundreds, if not thousands, of immigrants who otherwise couldn't get them because they were in the country illegally.

Arrested were Melita Dera Zilea, 28; Maggie E. Nelson, 46; Debbie H. Collins, 42; Jashonda Kaliha Scott, 28; and Patreese Harvey, 28. They were charged with four felonies, each carrying a maximum of five years in prison.

While the investigation is ongoing, the five are believed to be part of a larger ring, said Elizabeth Parker, a chief assistant state attorney who headed the task force.

"It was insane what was going on," she said. "They were bringing van loads of people from all over South Florida. It was so blatant."

While the exact number of licenses issued is unknown, as many as 40 were issued daily during the scheme that had been operating for more than a year.

Armed with counterfeit immigration documents often handed to them in the parking lot of the office on Military Trail, they were directed to one of the five license examiners. Few took the mandatory written exam, much less the driving test. For fees ranging from $500 to $2,500 for the documents and the special treatment, they walked away with valid licenses.

Some of the predominantly Haitian, Guatemalan and Mexican immigrants probably just wanted licenses so they could stay in the country, get a job, open a bank account and not live in fear that a simple traffic stop would land them in jail with the next stop their home country, Parker said. Others may have wanted them to snare lucrative jobs as drug mules, she said. With a valid license, they wouldn't have to worry that if stopped with illicit cargo, their cars would be searched.

So far, she said, there is no evidence that the scheme was linked to terrorist activity. But, she said, with so many driver's licenses issued to fake names, the prospect worries her.

David Westberry, communications director for the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, said the agency has flagged the licenses. If those who hold them are stopped for any reason, they will be arrested.

He said he has no idea how the five examiners were able to get away with the scam for so long. With 19 examiners, the office is the second-busiest in the county, processing an average of 408 customers a day compared to 470 at the West Palm Beach office, he said.

According to court documents, the immigration forms submitted were obviously phony. Westberry said the agency does random checks of documents that are scanned into computers. With nearly 20,000 a day streaming into computers in Tallahassee, the counterfeit documents were never detected.

In the wake of the arrests, he said the agency is reviewing its operations in hopes of plugging gaps. Further, he said, the agency plans to increase the presence of Florida Highway Patrol troopers at drivers license bureaus.

Once the examiners were arrested, the agency acted quickly, he said. All of the women, one of whom had worked for the agency for 12 years, were fired immediately.

More people could be arrested before the current investigation is closed, Parker said.

Already an immigrant from Haiti who was living in Delray Beach has been arrested for supplying counterfeit documents to those seeking driver's license. Alex Adrien, 42, was charged with multiple counts of fraud after he was stopped for a traffic violation and Delray Beach police said they found phony immigration documents in his trunk.

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