A suburban Chicago man received two years in prison for staging robberies to help people fraudulently apply for immigration visas.
Most of those who “benefited” from the robberies were from Latin America and South America.
“Defendant was the main organizer and at the center of almost every single one of the hundreds of staged robberies that were perpetrated,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Saqib Mohammad Hussain argued in the government’s sentencing memorandum. “Defendant significantly corrupted the federal U Visa program, designed to provide a benefit to a particularly vulnerable group—foreign nationals who are victims of serious crimes while visiting the United States.”
Five other people were also convicted.
A 2023 “robbery” in Chicago exposed a massive nationwide U.S. immigration scheme.
Yes, a robbery.
Between 2022 and 2024, Parth Nayi, 29, “organized and participated” in these robberies. From CWB Chicago:
Nayi recruited people to pose as robbery victims, paid store owners to use their businesses, coordinated and paid the people acting as robbers, and coached the purported victims through the scheme. Participants paid him between $5,000 and $30,000 each for the privilege of being “robbed,” hoping to obtain U-visas, which are available to eligible victims of certain crimes who assist law enforcement. Upon making payment, the “victims” were told to be at a certain business at a certain date and time, officials said. The “robbery crew” arrived shortly thereafter.The purported victims then sought certification from local law enforcement agencies confirming that they had been victims of qualifying crimes and had helped with investigations. After obtaining the certifications, the purported victims submitted fraudulent U-visa applications to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, prosecutors said.
It all went downhill in July 2023 at Bucktown Food & Liquor when a member of the “robbery crew” accidentally fired the gun and critically injured the 26-year-old employee.
Here’s how the scheme works:
After the robberies, the “victims” went to their local police departments to secure documentation that they were the victims of a crime that qualified them to apply for a “U-visa.” That’s an immigration status reserved for victims of certain crimes who have suffered mental or physical abuse and are helpful to law enforcement or government officials in an investigation or prosecution. Some relatives of U-visa recipients also qualify for special status and, in time, U-visa recipients may qualify for permanent residency.
CWBChicago listed 17 specific incidents:
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