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Washington: The US today filed denaturalization complaints in a federal court against an Indian man and two Pakistanis who allegedly obtained their naturalized American citizenship by fraud.
The three allegedly concealed their prior orders of exclusion and deportation under different identities than the identity under which they naturalized, the US Department of Justice and US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) said.
If convicted all the three, Parvez Manzoor Khan and Rashid Mahmood from Pakistan and Baljinder Singh from India would be deported to their respective home countries.
"The Justice Department is committed to preserving the integrity of our nation s immigration system, and in particular, the asylum and naturalisation processes, said Acting Assistant Attorney General Chad A Readler of the Justice Department s Civil Division.
"The civil complaints charge that defendants in these cases exploited our immigration system and unlawfully secured the ultimate immigration benefit of naturalization. The filing of these cases sends a clear message to immigration fraudsters if you break our immigration laws, we will prosecute you and denaturalize you, Readler said.
The three cases were referred to the Department of Justice by USCIS and identified as part of Operation Janus.
A Department of Homeland Security initiative, Operation Janus identified about 315,000 cases where some fingerprint data was missing from the centralized digital fingerprint repository.
Among those cases, some may have sought to circumvent criminal record and other background checks in the naturalisation process, a statement said.
These cases are the result of an ongoing collaboration between the two departments to investigate and seek denaturalization proceedings against those who obtained citizenship unlawfully, it said.
According to the complaint, Baljinder aka Davinder Singh, 43, a native of India, arrived at San Francisco International Airport on September 25, 1991, without any travel documents or proof of identity.
He claimed his name was Davinder Singh. He was placed in exclusion proceedings, but failed to appear for his immigration court hearing and was ordered excluded and deported on January 7, 1992.
Four weeks later, on February 6, 1992, he filed an asylum application under the name Baljinder Singh.
He claimed to be an Indian who entered the US without inspection.
Singh abandoned that application after he married a US citizen, who filed a visa petition on his behalf.
Singh naturalized under the name Baljinder Singh on July 28, 2006.
The civil complaints contain charges against defendants that include illegal procurement of naturalization by not being lawfully admitted for permanent residence, illegal procurement of naturalization due to lack of good moral character and procurement of US citizenship (concealment of a material fact or willful misrepresentation; false testimony).
