http://www.sjmercury.com/svtech/news/indepth/docs/h1b012300.htm
Posted at 10:39 p.m. PST Saturday, January 22, 2000

Audit details abuse of worker visa program
Berkeley sex case fuels criticism
BY BRANDON BAILEY AND PETE CAREY
Mercury News Staff Writers

Beyond the tragic story of young girls allegedly imported for sex, the case of a Berkeley businessman accused of arranging fraudulent visas illustrates a growing problem with an immigration program that many Silicon Valley firms -- and workers -- consider vital to their success.

Lakireddy Bali Reddy, 62, was jailed last week on federal charges that he brought the three teenage Indian girls to the United States for sexual purposes. Authorities say two of them entered the country by posing as daughters of a man who agreed to the scheme after Reddy helped him get a special visa to work at a Bay Area tech firm.

The H-1B visa is reserved for foreign workers with special skills who can perform jobs that are otherwise hard to fill. But authorities say the phony father actually worked at one of Reddy's restaurants.

Federal officials say fraudulent cases make up only a fraction of the overall number of visas issued. Yet, they say, instances of fraud appear to be on the rise, providing fresh ammunition to critics of the program.

``What we are increasingly seeing are cases . . . of visas approved for individuals to enter the U.S. on the premise that they will assume a highly technical job -- only to find that the individuals are low-skilled workers slated for employment as janitors or nurse's aides or store clerks,'' Jacquelyn Williams-Bridgers, the U.S. State Department's Inspector General, told Congress last May.


Success stories

Since it began 10 years ago, the H-1B program has been a boon both for high-tech companies and talented engineers and programmers from other countries, including people who have gone on to start their own firms or become top executives at Silicon Valley corporations.

``One black sheep does not make sheep black,'' said Ashok Banerjee, 26, a computer scientist at Oracle, who obtained one of the visas after earning a masters in computer science from the University of North Carolina.

``H-1B workers are just a community of technically skilled workers who have come to this country to accomplish their own individual goals,'' said Banerjee. ``And isn't capitalism about people accomplishing their own individual goals and hence building our goals collectively?''

But the program has been troubled by several recent cases of alleged fraud:


Last week, federal agents arrested 40 Indian immigrants in Texas. Officials said they suspected two subcontracting firms of bringing the workers into the United States under false pretenses.

In November, the president of an Atlanta software company pleaded guilty to smuggling at least 43 Indians into the United States by obtaining H-1B visas for jobs that didn't exist.

Last summer, Williams-Bridgers told Congress of a case in which a self-styled legal and financial consultant was forging H-1B visas and selling them to people who used them to obtain bogus Social Security cards and driver's licenses.
Such schemes are an attractive alternative to other means of entering the country illegally, said U.S. Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, chairman of a congressional subcommittee on immigration.

``Traveling with a visa offers safety and comfort,'' Smith said during the May hearing. ``Who wouldn't choose a comfortable seat on an airplane over the unventilated hold of a ship or a long-distance trek through the wilderness?''

The H-1B program has grown since its inception in 1990. Under pressure from the high-tech industry, Congress nearly doubled the annual quota on skilled foreign workers, from 65,000 in 1998 to 115,000 in 1999 and 2000.


Tracking system lacking

While many of these workers come to Silicon Valley, INS officials said the Reddy case is the only recent example of alleged H-1B fraud that has surfaced in California. But some officials have acknowledged that federal agencies have no centralized system for tracking visa fraud.

``There is very little hard data available,'' Justice Department Inspector General Michael Bromwich told Congress. He faulted both the INS and the State Department. ``This lack of comprehensive statistics hinders the ability (of authorities) to appropriately respond to visa fraud.''

One audit conducted by federal officials last year uncovered startling figures.

Of all the H-1B visas granted to immigrants from around the world, the largest number -- roughly 44 percent -- are issued in India, which has many skilled professionals who are eager to get experience working in this country. When U.S. officials audited about 3,200 visa applications submitted in Chennai, India, last year, they were unable to verify claims made on 45 percent of the applications.

Officials said 21 percent of the applications were found to be clearly fraudulent.

``I think we've seen the H-1B program is subject to manipulation by criminal conspiracies,'' said Chuck DeMore, the INS district director in San Francisco, whose office investigated the Reddy case. But he added that ``just about any kind of visa that's out there is subject to being fraudulently obtained.''


Other visa problems

Examples of fraud involving other types of visas run the gamut, according to federal officials. In one case, Bromwich testified, a former INS official based in San Jose was indicted for allegedly taking more than $450,000 in bribes to create false records so more than 200 Korean citizens could remain permanently in the United States.

In another case, officials say one of the suspects involved in a plot to bomb the Brooklyn subway was a Palestinian who entered this country on a visa that had been issued so he could catch a connecting flight to Ecuador.

As for Reddy, the Berkeley real-estate mogul is specifically charged with importing foreign nationals for immoral purposes and inducing them to enter the United States illegally. Authorities say they are still trying to determine if other visa abuses occurred. Reddy has denied any improprieties.

Despite the charges, supporters of the H-1B program call it a success.

``We certainly don't condone any kind of fraud,'' said John Hatch, a spokesman for the American Electronics Association, a high-tech industry trade group. But he said the program has been vital to helping the industry grow.

Since 1993, he said, high-tech firms have hired more than 1 million new employees, many of them in skilled technical jobs. Meanwhile, he said, the number of students earning degrees in those fields from universities in this country has dropped.

Some critics charge that the program can lead to exploitation of foreign workers and help employers avoid hiring qualified American workers who might demand higher salaries.

Others say the economic boom of the last decade is due in part to immigrants who bring their skills and energy in this country.

``We recruiters are struggling daily to find enough qualified people for the openings,'' said Bashker Biswas of Integrated Personnel Systems in Fremont. ``What choice do we have? We are looking around the U.S., around the world.

``The H-1B, it's absolutely useful,'' he said. ``If one or two people are bad apples, let's clean them out, but the concept or vision is not bad.''

Smith, the Texas congressman, also has urged greater efforts to weed out fraud.

Because there's a limit on the number of H-1B visas issued each year, said Allen Kay, the congressman's aide, ``Every visa that is used fraudulently is a visa denied to a U.S. company that has a legitimate need for an H-1B worker. The high-tech industry gets hurt with every single one of these cases.''




Contact Brandon Bailey at bbailey@sjmercury.com or (408) 920-5022.
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