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Hunch Unravels Immigrant Wedding Scam
Odd Behavior at Arlington Courthouse Leads to Arrests in Probe of Green-Card Marriages
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, November 13, 2006
They didn't hug. They didn't kiss. They didn't even sit together.
Many couples going to the Arlington County Courthouse seemed more like strangers than people applying for marriage licenses. A man named Sam often escorted them to the sixth-floor clerk's office. Sometimes, there would be a furtive exchange of money in the elevator.
Circuit Court Clerk David Bell tipped off police about the sham marriages, triggering a nearly four-year investigation.
Before long, some of the same people would be back, filing for divorce, their court papers littered with mistakes -- always the same mistakes.
"They misspelled 'circuit,' " said David A. Bell, the longtime Circuit Court clerk. "It was obvious something was going on."
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Informally, he named his business "the program." [I hate football movies.]
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Acquah set up shop in his government office, using his government-owned fax achine to communicate about illicit marriages. [well, at least he's more responsive than he normally is when doing his actual USCIS work.]
Word of the scheme spread to immigrants even before they left Ghana. "Those who were coming over here knew where to find an apartment, where to find a job and where to find a spouse," said one law enforcement official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing. [it was like Craigslist-Accra]
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the vast majority went to Arlington. The courthouse is on a Metro line, and plenty of civil magistrates nearby can perform a quick ceremony. "Everything was right there in the same spot," [all for a $1.35!]
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