San Jose – An Indian American businesswoman here pleaded guilty three counts of visa fraud and was sentenced to serve prison term and pay fines, according to court documents.
Sridevi Aiyaswamy (50) was sentenced to 13 months in prison on Wednesday (Dec.20) as a result of her involvement in executing an H-1B visa fraud scheme, announced US Attorney Brian J. Stretch and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Special Agent in Charge Ryan Spradlin.
Lucy H. Koh, United States District Judge handed down the sentence, after Aiyaswamy pleaded guilty to the crime on July 19, 2017. In addition to the prison term, Judge Koh sentenced Aiyaswamy to a $10,000 fine and a two-year period of supervised release. Judge Koh ordered the defendant to self-surrender by on February 14, 2018.
According to her plea agreement, Aiyaswamy, of San Jose, pleaded guilty to three counts of visa fraud. Aiyaswamy admitted that between April 2010 and June 2013 she made numerous false statements and submitted over 25 fraudulent documents to the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to obtain H-1B non-immigrant classifications for skilled foreign workers.
The documents detail that Aiyaswamy acted as a petitioner on behalf of foreign worker beneficiaries, and falsely represented in I-129 petitions that the foreign worker beneficiaries would be working at an information technology and networking company in San Jose, Calif.
Aiayswamy further submitted counterfeit statements of work with forged signatures as back-up documentation to the I-129 petitions. In fact, at the time she submitted these documents to USCIS, the court document noted that Aiyaswamy knew that the statements regarding offers of work from the South Bay company for these beneficiaries were false statements, and that the company had not made any offers of employment regarding these individuals.
Earlier on December 3, 2015, a federal grand jury indicted Aiyaswamy, charging her with 34 counts of visa fraud. After accepting a plea agreement, Aiyaswamy pleaded guilty to three of the counts of visa fraud and the remaining counts were dismissed.
Tejinder Singh, Editor, India America Today & White House Correspondent