How much is the U.S. citizenship worth? $44,000 and a pound of weed, apparently. At least that is what six immigration agents allegedly received from a scammer in Los Angeles. The six officers have been charged with bribery and immigration fraud.
A grand jury indicted the officers after outlining how attorney Kwang Man "John" Lee supposedly bribed immigration officials with cash and gifts to get immigration favors for his clients. Lee's alleged bribes ranged from a few hundred to tens of thousands, in exchange of admission stamps or lawful permanent residency status.
Lee has said that for a pound of marijuana and $44,000 he could get a client U.S. citizenship.
James Domínguez, 46, special agent with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; Paul Lovingood, 71, former United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) officer and Jesús Figueroa, 66, a USCIS supervisory officer, all have been indicited with receiving bribes in the form of cash and gifts such as computers and vacations.
An investigation revealed that Lee was the middleman and point-of-contact, and facilitated the bribery conspiracy between immigrants and government officials. He is a former immigration agent and became an attorney in 1997.
Lee had been previously charged of conspiring to defraud the U.S. government in a separate criminal complaint.
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