Tuesday, March 6, 2007

FilipinOnline NEWS:

WORK VISA FRAUD CASE MIGHT MEAN TROUBLE FOR SOME PINOYS

A Los Angeles-area law firm which has a number of Filipino employees and clients is in legal hot water for visa fraud. The ASK Law Group in Sherman Oaks is a popular immigration law firm catering to many of the area's immigrants.

Philip Abramowitz, a senior partner of ASK Group, even writes an immigration column for Filipino newspapers. He famously represented Donita Ganzon, the Filipino transgender who sued the government when it denied to give her spouse a green card. (Here's that story.)

Abramowitz has already pleaded guilty to conspiracy and visa fraud.

According to the LA Times, investigators discovered that some of their employees acquired their visas through the office illegally. They were given fake job titles and were paid "under the table".

This charge doesn't bode well for some of ASK's Filipino clientele.

Per immigration officials, if they found out that any of the firm's clients knew that their papers were acquired illegally (by using fake job titles on their visa application, etc.), they could lose their working visas.

Tune in later in the week for more details about this story.

No comments: