NYC Couple Arranged Sham Marriages For Immigrants: Feds

NEW YORK — Federal authorities have accused a Brooklyn man and his Queens wife of running a scheme in which they were paid to arrange sham green card marriages. William Jacobsen and Marta Medvedeva recruited U.S. citizens to marry immigrants so they could get permanent residency in the country, the Brooklyn U.S. Attorney's Office said Tuesday.

The pair also provided false or misleading documentation and coached the fake couples on how to get through immigration interviews, prosecutors say.

"The defendants’ scheme to game the system and reap ill-gotten profits by promoting sham marriages is not only criminal, it is an affront to those individuals who abide by the rules to obtain permanent residency in the United States lawfully," U.S. Attorney Richard P. Donoghue said in a statement.

Medvedeva is a natural-born Ukrainian citizen who became an American citizen in September 2014 because of her marriage to Jacobsen, according to a criminal complaint. Authorities say the pair ran their scheme between November 2016 and this month.

The foreign nationals whom they helped paid about $30,000 for their services, some of which was passed on to the citizens who were involved, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.

A prosecutor said in court that Jacobsen recently got ordained as a minister so he could perform weddings, a spokesman for the office said.

Law enforcement captured several conversations between Medvedeva and Jacobsen about the scheme, the complaint says. In a recorded chat with a source posing as a potential citizen spouse, Jacobsen said the immigration interview is "the easy part" of the process, according to the complaint.

"The hardest part is the marriage, cause both sides are nervous, they have to go there and kiss each other," he said, according to a transcript in the complaint.

Medvedeva and Jacobsen have been charged with conspiring and aiding and abetting others to enter into sham marriages and with evading immigration laws by making false statements in affidavits, applications and other documents, according to prosecutors.

Jacobsen was ordered detained in federal court on Tuesday and Medvedeva was still awaiting an appearance before a magistrate judge as of Tuesday evening, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office said.

Both of them face up to 10 years in prison if convicted, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.

(Lead image: Photo from Shuttertstock)