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November 21, 2022

Ruixue “Serena” Shi will spend 20 years in federal prison and has been ordered to pay nearly $36 million in restitution for defrauding investors out of tens of millions of dollars. Shi, convicted on one count of wire fraud, was the general manager of Global House Buyer LLC, a China-based real estate company with an office in Los Angeles. Shi inked a deal with Dakota Development, a subsidiary of SBE Entertainment, to build a real estate development in the City of Coachella consisting of luxury condos, a hotel complex, and conference facilities. Shi solicited investments from mostly Chinese investors, preying on their ignorance of English and trust in the American economy, and led them to believe their investment would help them obtain an American visa. USAO CDCA

February 11, 2022

Defendants Seyed Taher Kameli and his companies, Chicagoland Foreign Investment Group, LLC and American Enterprise Pioneers, Inc., will pay jointly and severally $1.6 million after entering into a judgment for defrauding EB-5 immigrant investors. Kameli is an immigration attorney, some of whose clients were victims of the fraud. He promised at least 226 foreign investors that their $500,000 investments would finance construction of a senior living project and pave the way for at least 10 permanent full-time jobs, as well as qualifying each investor for a path to permanent U.S. residency. Instead, he commingled and misused some of the $88.7 million raised. Defendants are enjoined from further violations of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and Rule 10b-5 thereunder. Kameli also agreed administratively to a 5-year suspension from practicing before the SEC as an attorney. SEC

December 18, 2019

Abhijit Prasad was sentenced to 3 years in prison following his conviction for visa fraud and related charges.  Prasad submitted 19 applications for H-1B visas for individuals he claimed would be performing work for Cisco Systems although Cisco had no expectation that the foreign workers would perform work for them and, in some cases, Prasad submitted forged documents purporting to be from Cisco.  Prasad was also ordered to forfeit $1.9 million.  USAO ED Cal; USAO ND Cal

December 17, 2019

India-based outsourcing and business consulting firm Infosys Ltd. has agreed to pay $800,000 to the State of California to resolve allegations that the company misclassified approximately 500 Infosys employees as working in California on B-1 visas rather than H-1B visas.  By using the B-1 visas, Infosys avoided California payroll taxes and avoided the H-1B obligation to pay workers at the local prevailing wage.  The case was initiated by a whistleblower complaint under the California False Claims Act filed by Jack "Jay" B. Palmer, who will receive 15% of the settlement.  CA

November 4, 2019

Golden California Regional Center and its principal Bethany Liou will pay over $50 million in disgorgement and interest to resolve charges of fraud in connection with their sale of interests in the GCRC Cupertino Fund, LP as securities qualifying under the EB-5 visa program.  Defendants represented that investor funds would be used to finance real estate development but, in fact, Liou diverted the funds to personal use.  SEC

September 20, 2019

Pradyumna Kumar Samal, the former CEO of two Bellevue, Washington IT firms, has been sentenced to more than seven years in prison for his role in a long-running H1-B visa fraud scheme.  Samal's companies, Divensi and Azimetry, were employment agencies in the business of providing IT workers to major corporate clients.  Samal would submit fraudulent applications on behalf of foreign workers, claiming that they were being brought to the U.S. to perform a specific job, and instructing them to lie in their own applications, when, in fact, after being admitted, the employees would be benched and unpaid until Samal's companies were able to place them at actual client jobs.  In addition, Samal's companies failed to pay employment taxes on behalf of the foreign workers, instead diverting those funds to his personal use.  USAO WD WA

October 18, 2018

Jean Danhong Chen, an attorney, and Tony Jianyun Ye have been charged by the SEC with securities violations arising from their sale of EB-5 securities to Chen's clients, earning over $10 million in undisclosed commissions.  Chen and Ye operated an EB-5 regional center, Golden State Regional Center LLC, and advised Chen's clients to invest in the center’s projects while concealing their ownership interest. After learning of the SEC’s investigation, Chen and Ye allegedly backdated documents and scrubbed other business records to conceal their role in the alleged scheme.  SEC

June 13, 2018

Venkat Guntpally was sentenced to 30 months in prison following his guilty plea on charges of visa fraud and related crimes.  Guntpally admitted that employment staffing companies that he founded submitted fraudulent petitions to the U.S. government for foreign workers to receive H-1B visas, including by misrepresenting the companies at which the workers would be employed.  ND Cal

March 5, 2018

The SEC charged a Edwin Shaw LLC with illegally brokering dozens of investments by foreign nationals seeking U.S. residency. Between April 2014 and March 2017, Edwin Shaw solicited foreign nationals to invest in securities issued by a taxi and limousine company based in Queens, New York.  The investments were marketed to investors interested in applying for legal residency through the federal government’s EB-5 Immigrant Investor Program, which provides a path to legal residency for foreigners who invest directly in a U.S. business or private “regional centers” that promote economic development in specific areas and industries. Edwin Shaw agreed to a cease-and-desist order and agreed to pay disgorgement of $400,000 plus prejudgment interest of $54,209.20 and a penalty of $90,535. SEC

February 2, 2018

The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced that the Miami-based businessman behind an alleged scheme involving investments in a Vermont-based ski resort has agreed to pay back more than $81 million of investor money that he used illegally. According to an SEC complaint filed in 2016 in federal court in Miami, Ariel Quiros allegedly misused more than $50 million in investor funds to purchase a different ski resort and to fund personal expenses such as income taxes and two luxury New York City condominium purchases. Investors were told their money would specifically be used for construction projects at the Jay Peak Resort and a nearby proposed biomedical research facility. Companies owned by Quiros also allegedly failed to contribute approximately $30 million in investor funds toward Jay Peak construction, with two projects going uncompleted. This jeopardized investors' investments as well as their participation in the EB-5 Immigrant Investor Program under which Quiros and his businesses solicited the money. SEC
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