Posted on 06/02/2006 5:19:05 PM PDT by VU4G10
LOS ANGELES -- Luis Hernandez just laughs as he sells fake driver's licenses and Social Security cards to illegal immigrants near a park known for shady deals. The joke - to him and others in his line of work - is the government's promise to put people like him out of business with a tamperproof national ID card.
"One way or another, we'll always find a way," said Hernandez, 35, a sidewalk operator who is part of a complex counterfeiting network around MacArthur Park, where authentic-looking IDs are available for as little as $150.
Some of those coming to MacArthur Park are teenagers who want a fake ID so they can go to bars and drink. Others are ex-convicts whose criminal records make working under their real names difficult. But most are illegal immigrants who need work documents.
As Congress struggles to reform laws that affect the nation's estimated 11 million illegal immigrants, one central question is how to crack down on fake documents and punish the employers who accept them.
President Bush has suggested foreign workers carry a single ID that includes a fingerprint. The House and Senate, meanwhile, have passed bills that would force employers to verify job seekers' Social Security numbers with a phone call and immigration status through an electronic database.
Many employers, eager for cheap labor, have a "don't ask, don't tell" attitude toward their employees' immigration status and do not check their papers.
In one indication of the size of the problem, federal authorities in April arrested nearly 1,200 illegal immigrants and a few managers working at IFCO Systems plants from Southern California to New York. More than half of the 5,800 employees at the pallet and crate manufacturing company in 2005 had invalid or mismatched Social Security numbers, authorities said.
Immigration officials said the fake document business has become increasingly difficult to stop.
In the past, authorities could often break up a network by raiding a central "document mill" where Social Security cards, passports and licenses might be drying on a large printing press, said Kevin Jeffery, deputy agent in charge of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Los Angeles.
Now documents are made with illegal software on laptop computers. That mobility makes them harder to bust.
"With a computer and a printer, you are in business," Jeffery said.
Authorities can also be stymied by complex delivery networks.
Around MacArthur Park, sellers who openly offer fake IDs do not actually carry any of the documents. Instead, they negotiate prices as high as $300 for a package containing a driver's license, Social Security card and green card. Next, they send the buyer to a less crowded area a few blocks away, where a picture is taken and the customer pays up.
The picture and cash change hands a few times before arriving at an apartment where a laptop, printer and laminating machine spit out the documents. Within an hour, a runner - perhaps a young man dressed as a student, or an elderly woman - delivers the documents near the site of the original deal.
Hernandez, an illegal immigrant from Mexico, said it is not easy work. The biggest threats are disgruntled customers, undercover agents who record deals with cameras the size of a button, and gang members demanding protection money.
When Hernandez senses a customer might be a police officer, he calls out "7/11," and his underlings disappear. If a seller is arrested, others collect money to bail him out of jail.
"We are not trying to do anything bad," said Sergio Guitierrez, 35, an illegal immigrant from Mexico who sells IDs. "Immigrants just need to work."
"This is the government's fault," said Maria Zuniga, 55, an illegal immigrant from Honduras who sells and transports documents. "They won't even give us a number to work or a driver's license."
I'm in the distinct minority here who have long called for a tamper-proof national citizenship card. We can do it, but we just don't want to.
Somebody ought to take this pissant smarmy little illegal alien turd out back and take the smile off his face.
It's obvious ICE isn't going to do it.
I am inclined to favor it, too.
First my car was stolen and found in Mexico, trashed. Today I found out they cloned my debit card and made some charges on it. I check my account all the time, so I caught it immediately. I had my debit card on me all the time so I never thought they could do that from the information in the car.
Reporting it to the police was like telling them the sky was blue. "Yawn."
A national citizenship card would eliminate voter fraud as well.
Something to consider.
I'll join you. I'm uncomfortable with an internal passport but we need to solve the problem.
Uh, why aren't the police there, making a freekin' arrest?!?
I am shocked.
Four or five years ago, I would have been pummelled by now. I think Rep. Lamar Smith was pushing the concept at the time. It was before 9/11 and his angle was the illegal alien problem.
It was 99% AGAINST the idea here at FR.
Perceptions change, I guess.
My feeling was that any investigation by the government into my identity, even not requiring a warrant, would yield them at least as much information as a national citizenship card would provide.
But it would differentiate between those of us who own this country and this who don't, and protect the electoral process as well.
But all I heard was "ZHOW ME YOUR PAPERS!"
"We are not trying to do anything bad," said Sergio Guitierrez, 35, an illegal immigrant from Mexico who sells IDs. "Immigrants just need to work."
"This is the government's fault," said Maria Zuniga, 55, an illegal immigrant from Honduras who sells and transports documents. "They won't even give us a number to work or a driver's license."
(Bangs his head on the wall over and over and over and.....)
One of the biggest threats is from gang bangers demanding protection money? Hell, I bet 90 percent of these gangsters are illegals themselves!
Well if employers could/would verify a SS# belongs to the person applying for a job, wouldn't that stop some of the people from getting hired. Of course all they have to do is go and buy a new set of ID's.
Fazed? I'd say the forgery lobby is positivly elated.
Finding your cloned National ID Card will really bum you out.
The MacArthur Park fake ID bazaar has been in operation since the 1970s. You'll even see it featured in movies. If the police aren't closing it down it's because someone won't let them.
This SS# identification thing is an incredibly stupid form of identification. At the VERY most, it can ensure that a SS# matches the name it was issued to.
If you have a name that matches a SS # when you apply for a job, you won't be caught. And I can tell you an easy and legal place to get all the matching names and numbers you want. And that list won't be removed EVER.
At least half of the gang members of some the larger LA gangs, White Fence for example, are illegals. Some smaller gangs are almost entirely illegals.
...we're screwed, aren't we...
Yea, and 18th street and mara salvatrucha.
the other half of gang members are children of illegal immigrants, actually its probably more than half.
What tuff immigration talk? I havn't heard any at all. Not from the Prez, not from the Senate. These guys know who's on their side, what's to be afraid of?
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