CALIFORNIA
A grand jury indicted a 63-year-old man who scammed 500 undocumented immigrants for hundreds of thousands of dollars by promising them that they would get U.S. citizenships by getting adopted by American citizens, according to officials.
“The indictment returned today alleges a particularly predatory and manipulative type of fraud that takes advantage of the hopes and dreams of undocumented immigrants to extract fees based on false promises,” said U.S. Attorney Benjamin Wagner. “The adoption of adult aliens is not a legitimate path to U.S. citizenship. While the charges against this defendant are only allegations at this point, no one should pay fees to anyone making false promises of citizenship through adult adoption.”
Helaman Hansen, 63, of Elk Grove, California, is charged in a 13-count indictment charging him with conspiracy to commit mail fraud and wire fraud, 11 counts of mail fraud and one count of wire fraud for operating a fraudulent adult-adoption program that targeted undocumented aliens, according to Wagner.
Hansen was arrested Thursday.
If convicted, he is facing up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
According to court documents, between October 2012 and January 2016, Hansen and others used various entities such as Americans Helping America to sell members of immigrant communities memberships in what he called a “Migration Program.”
Hansen sold memberships for annual fees of $150 but that fee gradually grew and eventually was as high as $10,000, officials said.
“It is very unfortunate that some in our communities would choose to misrepresent the American immigration system to deceive and hurt those who are trying only to make a better life for themselves and their families,” said Special Agent in Charge Ryan L. Spradlin for Homeland Security Investigation’s San Francisco Field Office. “It is our entrusted duty to hold these criminals accountable for their actions – and so we shall.”
According to the indictment, although some victims completed the adoption stage of the “Migration Program,” not one person obtained citizenship.
As early as October 2012, Hansen had been informed by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services that aliens adopted after their sixteenth birthdays could not obtain citizenship in the manner Hansen was promoting.
Despite that notification, Hansen and his co-conspirators induced approximately 500 victims to pay more than $500,000 to join the fraudulent program.
Hansen is presumed innocent unless proven guilty.
The FBI and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations investigated this case.
(KCRA NBC News Report)