Immigration News

NEWS RELEASE – September 9, 2009
CONTACT:   Alicia Maxey Greene  212-335-9400

Manhattan District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau announced today the indictment and arrest of a Queens man for defrauding individuals by falsely holding himself out as an attorney, purporting to provide immigration legal services and advice, and selling a forged Social Security card.

The defendant, ROBERT MANGIERI, 68, has been indicted on charges of scheme to defraud, grand larceny, criminal possession of a forged instrument and practicing or appearing as an attorney-at-law without being admitted and registered. The crimes charged in the indictment occurred between December 2003 and September 2008.

The investigation leading to today’s indictment and arrest revealed that MANGIERI operated Mangieri & Associates, with offices at 3001 Broadway in Astoria and 8260 116th Street in Richmond Hill.  MANGIERI purported to offer assistance with applications and petitions pending with the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS).

The investigation further revealed that a victim sought help from MANGIERI to file appropriate paperwork to remain and work legally in the United States.  After charging the victim several hundred dollars and assuring her his fee was lower than one she could expect from other attorneys, MANGIERI guided her through the filing of several applications with USCIS, including an application for employment authorization.  MANGIERI sent USCIS the victim’s employment authorization application directly, along with a letter written on paper bearing the letterhead Hon. Robert P. Mangieri and signed the Hon. Robert P. Mangieri.  USCIS denied the victim’s application for work authorization.  The victim, who was in the United States on a visitor’s visa, did not qualify for employment authorization, as she did not have an application for a green card pending with USCIS.  After the victim’s application for employment authorization was denied, MANGIERI offered to and ultimately did procure a forged Social Security card with the victim’s Tax Identification Number on it.  During the process of applying to USCIS and after several applications had been denied, MANGIERI asked for more money, and the victim doubted him.  To win back her trust, MANGIERI showed the victim what appeared to be a badge, thereby adding to the impression MANGIERI had already created that he was a retired judge or a law enforcement official.  In total, the victim paid MANGIERI approximately $1,300 for his services and for fees MANGIERI claimed were required for filing applications with USCIS.

MANGIERI gave the victim a business card bearing the name “Robert P. Mangieri” above the words “Juris Doctor.”  It also says “Mangieri & Associates,” provides a P.O. Box and a telephone number, and bears an image of the scales of justice.

When MANGIERI offered to procure the Social Security card, the victim contacted Emerald Isle Immigration Center in the Bronx, which referred her to the Manhattan District Attorney’s Immigrant Affairs Program.

MANGIERI is not a licensed attorney. The Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) confirmed that MANGIERI is not an accredited representative authorized to represent clients before USCIS or the immigration courts.

USCIS confirmed that MANGIERI was involved in filing other applications or the representation of other victims before USCIS.  Those applications were also denied.  We encourage all those who sought services from MANGIERI to contact the Immigrant Affairs Program hotline at 212-335-3600.

MANGIERI has been indicted on one count of Scheme to Defraud in the First Degree, a class E felony punishable by up to 1⅓ to 4 years in prison; one count of Grand Larceny in the Fourth Degree, a class E felony; one count of Criminal Possession of a Forged Instrument in the Second Degree, a class D felony punishable by up to 2⅓ to 7 years in prison; and two counts of Practicing or Appearing As An Attorney-At-Law Without Being Admitted and Registered, a Judiciary Law misdemeanor punishable by up to 1 year in jail.

The investigation is continuing.  The defendant is scheduled to be arraigned today in State Supreme Court, Part 1.

Mr. Morgenthau thanked the Office of Fraud Detection & National Security, New York District, within USCIS; Emerald Isle Immigration Center; and the Fraud and Abuse Prevention Coordinator of the Office of the General Counsel, Executive Office for Immigration Review within the U.S. Department of Justice.

Assistant District Attorney Om Gillett of the Special Prosecutions Bureau is handling the prosecution of this case with the assistance of Assistant District Attorney Daysi Mejia, Attorney-in-Charge of the District Attorney’s Office Immigrant Affairs Program and under the supervision of Assistant District Attorney Thomas Wornom, Chief of the Special Prosecutions Bureau.  Detective Carlo Fargnoli of the District Attorney's Detective Squad assisted in the investigation under the supervision of Sgt. Edward England and Captain Ronald Haas.

 Defendant Information:

ROBERT MANGIERI, 5/20/1941

102 Haney Road

Kunkletown, Pennsylvania

8260 116th Street

Richmond Hill, New York

 ###

The online entry registration period for the DV-2011 Diversity Visa lottery is between noon, Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) (GMT-4), Friday, October 2, 2009, and noon, Eastern Standard Time (EST) (GMT-5), Monday, November 30, 2009. Entrants apply on Form DS-5501, Electronic  Diversity Visa Entry Form available only during the DV open registration period. Review the DV-2011 Instructions below for more information.

The English version of the DV-2011 Lottery Instructions is available in PDF format for your convenience.

Applications for the DV lottery should be made at the official US Department of State website at www.dvlottery.state.gov. It is highly recommended that applications be submitted online before the last week of the application period when servers are backed up due to high volume.

For more information on the lottery program go to the US State Department Diversity Visa Program webpage.

Important Notice about DV-2011:
The online entry registration period for DV-2011 will be October 2 until
November 30, 2009. 

Please,
check back later for updates and instructions regarding online entry for
DV-2011.

 

http://travel.state.gov/visa/immigrants/types/types_1322.html

September 2009

Ireland's economic boom during the 1990s brought unprecedented levels of prosperity and helped transform it into a "country of net immigration" by the early 2000s. For the first time in its history, Ireland experienced a significant inflow of migrants — both workers and asylum seekers — from outside the European Union.

Consequently, Ireland had to develop policies in a very short period of time. Three policy areas stand out. . . .

Read the full article at Migration Information Source

THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
———————-
For Immediate Release  -  June 25, 2009

REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
AFTER MEETING WITH MEMBERS OF CONGRESS
TO DISCUSS IMMIGRATION
State Dining Room
3:17 P.M. EDT

THE PRESIDENT: Hello, everybody.  We have just finished what I consider to be a very productive meeting on one of the most critical issues that I think this nation faces, and that is an immigration system that is broken and needs fixing.

We have members of Congress from both chambers, from parties, who have participated in the meeting and shared a range of ideas.  I think the consensus is that despite our inability to get this passed over the last several years, the American people still want to see a solution in which we are tightening up our borders, or cracking down on employers who are using illegal workers in order to drive down wages — and oftentimes mistreat those workers.  And we need a effective way to recognize and legalize the status of undocumented workers who are here.

Now, this is — there is not by any means consensus across the table.  As you can see, we've got a pretty diverse spectrum of folks here.  But what I'm encouraged by is that after all the overheated rhetoric and the occasional demagoguery on all sides around this issue, we've got a responsible set of leaders sitting around the table who want to actively get something done and not put it off until a year, two years, three years, five years from now, but to start working on this thing right now.

My administration is fully behind an effort to achieve comprehensive immigration reform.  I have asked my Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Secretary Janet Napolitano, to lead up a group that is going to be working with a leadership group from both the House and the Senate to start systematically working through these issues from the congressional leaders and those with the relevant jurisdiction. What we've heard is through a process of regular order, they would like to work through these issues both in the House and in the Senate.

In the meantime, administratively there are a couple of things that our administration has already begun to do.  The FBI has cleared much of the backlog of immigration background checks that was really holding up the legal immigration process.  DHS is already in the process of cracking down on unscrupulous employers, and, in collaboration with the Department of Labor, working to protect those workers from exploitation.

The Department of Homeland Security has also been making good progress in speeding up the processing of citizenship petitions, which has been far too slow for far too long — and that, by the way, is an area of great consensus, cuts across Democratic and Republican parties, the notion that we've got to make our legal system of immigration much more efficient and effective and customer-friendly than it currently is.

Today I'm pleased to announce a new collaboration between my Chief Information Officer, my Chief Performance Officer, my Chief Technologies Officer and the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Office to make the agency much more efficient, much more transparent, much more user-friendly than it has been in the past.

In the next 90 days, USCIS will launch a vastly improved Web site that will, for the first time ever, allow applicants to get updates on their status of their applications via e-mail and text message and online.  And anybody who's dealt with families who are trying to deal with — navigate the immigration system, this is going to save them huge amounts of time standing in line, waiting around, making phone calls, being put on hold.  It's an example of some things that we can do administratively even as we're working through difficult issues surrounding comprehensive immigration.

And the idea is very simple here:  We're going to leverage cutting-edge technology to reduce the unnecessary paperwork, backlogs, and the lack of transparency that's caused so many people so much heartache.
Now, we all know that comprehensive immigration reform is difficult.  We know it's a sensitive and politically volatile issue.  One of the things that was said around the table is the American people still don't have enough confidence that Congress and any administration is going to get serious about border security, and so they're concerned that any immigration reform simply will be a short-term legalization of undocumented workers with no long-term solution with respect to future flows of illegal immigration.

What's also been acknowledged is that the 12 million or so undocumented workers are here — who are not paying taxes in the ways that we'd like them to be paying taxes, who are living in the shadows, that that is a group that we have to deal with in a practical, common-sense way.  And I think the American people are ready for us to do so.  But it's going to require some heavy lifting, it's going to require a victory of practicality and common sense and good policymaking over short-term politics.  That's what I'm committed to doing as President.

I want to especially commend John McCain, who's with me today, because along with folks like Lindsey Graham, he has already paid a significant political cost for doing the right thing. I stand with him, I stand with Nydia Velázquez and others who have taken leadership on this issue.  I am confident that if we enter into this with the notion that this is a nation of laws that have to be observed and this is a nation of immigrants, then we're going to create a stronger nation for our children and our grandchildren.

So thank you all for participating.  I'm looking forward to us getting busy and getting to work.  All right?  Thank you.

Oh, and by the way, I hope everybody has got their Hawaiian shirts — (laughter) — and their mumus for our luau tonight.

ADMINISTRATION OFFICIALS:

Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano

Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis

Deputy Attorney General David Ogden

Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel

 

MEMBERS OF CONGRESS:

Senator Richard Durbin

Senator John Cornyn    

Senator Dianne Feinstein

Senator Lindsey Graham

Senator Jon Kyl

Senator Patrick Leahy

Senator Mel Martinez

Representative Howard Berman

Representative Anh Cao

Representative James Clyburn

Representative John Conyers

Representative Joe Crowley

Representative Lincoln Diaz Balart

Representative Gabrielle Giffords

Representative Luis Gutierrez

Representative Sheila Jackson Lee

Representative Zoe Lofgren

Representative Adam Putnam

Representative Silvestre Reyes

Representative Loretta Sanchez

Representative Heath Shuler

Representative Lamar Smith

Representative Nydia Velazquez

Representative Anthony Weiner