Louisiana police chiefs charged in immigrant visa fraud scheme : NPR

The Eoir (Executive Office for Immigration Review) Oakdale Court Immigration, Bottom, is seen in this aerial photo in Oakdale, Louisiana, Tuesday, April 8, 2025.

Gerald Herbert / AP

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Gerald Herbert / AP

Federal prosecutors charged five people in Louisiana, including three current and former police chiefs, in an alleged project aimed at submitting false police reports that allowed immigrants to request special visas in exchange for thousands of dollars.

According to the Indictment of 62The defendants falsified the police reports, who listed immigrants as victims of fabricated crimes so that they can ask for U.

The status of non-immigrant, or U-visa, allows people who have been victims of crimes to obtain temporary legal status in the United States.

The five accused were accused of conspiracy to commit visa fraud and mail fraud. Some are also faced with accusations of money laundering, visa fraud and corruption, according to court documents.

In the indictment, federal prosecutors allege that between December 2015 and earlier this week, the defendants conspired each other to authenticate “false police reports in several parishes of the center of Louisiana”.

Reports, according to the acts of accusation, “listed several victims of alleged armed steering wheel in the central region of Louisiana”. False reports were produced “so that the alleged victims of thefts can ask for visas”.

One of the accused, a businessman from Louisiana, worked as an intermediary between immigrants looking for U-visas and his four law enforcement partners in the regime, according to the indictment.

For each alleged victim appointed on these police reports, prosecutors allege that the businessman would pay $ 5,000 in accused co-conspirators.

The businessman reached a U-visa himself in 2023 “on the basis of his alleged status victim of an armed robbery,” according to the indictment.

If they are guilty, defendants risk years or decades in prison, as well as substantial fines.

Louisiana’s prosecutor General Liz Murrill said additional state accusations were likely.

“We are now examining the evidence and we expect additional state accusations will follow,” it will follow written in a declaration on Facebook.

“Officials – in particular those who have conspired the police – who conspire to commit fraud and hinder justice violate the public’s confidence and undermine the faith in justice. They will be held responsible.”