Wilmington – An Indian citizen with US legal permanent residency status pleaded guilty this week to visa fraud and money laundering, while operating several businesses which applied for H-1B visas on behalf of persons who were in the US on student visas which were about to expire.
United States Attorney Charles M. Oberly, III, announced that Srinivas Doppalapudi, a 45 year old citizen of India, in the United States with green card status, pleaded guilty in the District Court of Sue L. Robinson (District of Delaware – Wilmington) to visa fraud and money laundering.
Doppalapudi’s sentencing has been tentatively scheduled for a date in September. Visa fraud and money laundering are each punishable by a maximum penalty of ten years incarceration and a $250,000 fine.
According to statements made and documents filed in court, from March 2007 through September 2010, Doppalapudi submitted 33 fraudulent H-1B visa applications.
The legal documents showed that in entering his guilty plea to visa fraud, “Doppalapudi admitted that from March 2007 through September 2010, he operated several businesses which variously applied for H-1B visas and that on 33 occasions he submitted to the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service, service contracts which were false, in that, no such agreement or contract existed and the contracts bore the forged signature of one of the purported parties.”
Moreover, Doppalapudi made wire transfers of more than $1 million from his business bank accounts in the United States to a bank account in India. Doppalapudi’s guilty plea to money laundering relates to his transfer of funds, criminally derived from his visa fraud scheme, from his business accounts to his personal account.
Doppalapudi was detained without bail, pending sentencing in September.
The H-1B Specialty Workers visa program allows an employer to temporarily employ a foreign worker in the United States on a non-immigrant basis in a “specialty occupation.” Current law limits to 62,000 the number of H-1B visas that may be issued annually.
The prosecution was a result of a joint investigation by the United States Department of Labor, Office of Inspector General, Office of Labor Racketeering and Fraud Investigations; the Internal Revenue Service – Criminal Investigation Division; and Immigration and Customs Enforcement; and the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service – Office of Fraud Detection and National Security. (IATNS)