ICE Attorney Allegedly Stole Immigrants’ Identities to Defraud Credit Card Companies

Here’s some infuriating news that will make you want to throw your laptop out the window, hoping it hits the White House. The chief counsel of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has been charged with stealing immigrants’ identities in Seattle. Prosecutors say Raphael A. Sanchez was attempting to use the identities he stole in order to defraud credit card companies such as Bank of America, Capital One, and American Express. The alleged crimes are said to have taken place between October 2013 and October 2017.

Allegedly, Sanchez stole the identities of seven individuals “in various stages of immigration proceedings.” It’s speculated that a plea deal is in the works, based on the kind of charging document that was filed. As NBC News notes, an “information,” as it’s called, can only be filed if the defendant has waived his or her right to be indicted by a grand jury. According to the court’s calendar, Sanchez is set to enter a plea on Thursday.

The charging document sheds little light on the specifics of the case, but it did cite an incident from April 2016. Sanchez is said to have emailed himself the personal details belonging to a Chinese national referred to as R.H., from his government email account to his Yahoo one. These details included a permanent residency card, a utility bill, and the biographical page of the individual’s passport. Kind of a dumb move for an attorney.