Washington, D.C. - United States Attorney Jeffrey A. Taylor, Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office Joseph Persichini, Inspector General for the Department of Labor Gordon S. Heddell, Charles R. Pine, Special Agent in Charge, Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation, and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Special Agent in Charge William F. Reid jointly announced today that a District of Columbia jury returned guilty verdicts against Golam Razaul Karim, owner of Peoples Pest Control of Fairfax, Virginia, and his wife Naureen Moin, for immigration fraud, and ordered them to forfeit $17,162 in illegal proceeds, and also found Karim guilty of money laundering. United States District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan set sentencing for March 6, 2008.

The charges against Karim and Moin related to their roles in a wide-ranging immigration fraud scheme led by former D.C. immigration attorney Mohamed Alamgir, a naturalized United States citizen originally from Bangladesh, who pled guilty on April 23, 2004 to a 164-count criminal Information charging immigration fraud and money laundering, and was later sentenced to serve 40 months in prison and forfeit over $2 million in illegal proceeds. The scheme called for myriad small-business owners to support the fraudulent labor-based immigration applications of aliens who were never intended to, and never did, work for the employers, or for non-existent aliens whose approved documentation would be used by real persons seeking immigration status. Among those employers were Karim, age 42, and Moin, age 31, both also originally from Bangladesh.

“These defendants played essential parts in Mr. Alamgir’s corrupt scheme, which enabled the conspirators to extort large sums of money from people willing to use illegal means to gain U.S. immigration status,” stated U.S. Attorney Jeffrey A. Taylor. “This criminal enterprise undermined the integrity of our nation’s labor and immigration processes and compromised the security of our nation’s border controls.” U.S. Department of Labor Inspector General Gordon S. Heddell added, “This verdict and forfeiture represent a stern warning for those who would aid and abet schemes to defraud Department of Labor programs. This office will continue to work with other law enforcement agencies to aggressively investigate fraud committed against the Department’s Foreign Labor Certification programs.”

In announcing the guilty verdict, U.S. Attorney Taylor, FBI Assistant Director in Charge Persichini, DOL Inspector General Heddell, IRS Special Agent in Charge Pine, and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Special Agent in Charge William F. Reid expressed appreciation for the outstanding investigative work of Special Agents William Jones and Derek Pickle of the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Inspector General; Special Agents Marvin Strickland (now retired), Andrew Carlie, and Daniel Haser of the Federal Bureau of Investigation; Special Agents Nicole Pompei and Andrea Gonzalez of the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation; and Special Agent Katherine Menhart of ICE. They also noted the significant contributions of United States Attorney’s Office personnel who supported the prosecution, including paralegal Melanie Howard, supervisory paralegal Elizabeth Barns, litigation services specialists Oliver John-Baptiste and Joseph Calvarese, victim-witness specialists DawnTolson-Hightower and David Foster, and legal assistants Ahmika Isaac and Tiffany Walker. They also commended the work of Assistant U.S. Attorneys Laura A. Ingersoll and Jonathan M. Malis, who prosecuted the case, and John D. Crabb and William Cowden, who assisted.

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