LOS ANGELES, Dec 1: US authorities have arrested 44 people for allegedly charging Asian immigrants 60,000 dollars to set up elaborate sham marriages aimed at fraudulently winning US residency, officials said on Wednesday. The sophisticated scam set up marriages of convenience between US citizens and Chinese and Vietnamese immigrants and even supplied them with fake wedding photographs, joint tax returns and even pre-fabricated love letters to help them win ‘green card’ residence permits, immigration officials said.

The 44 suspects, many of them from the an area near Los Angeles known as ‘Little Saigon’ because of its large Vietnamese community, were charged following a three-year undercover probe dubbed ‘Operation Newlywed Game’.

“The probe, led by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), is believed to be one of the largest marriage fraud investigations ever undertaken in the United States,” ICE spokeswoman Virginia Kice said.

The suspects were rounded up across in 13 cities and towns near Los Angeles and in the San Francisco area on Tuesday, including a travel agency in Little Saigon suspected of being used as a front to facilitate marriage fraud.

The charges against them include conspiracy, misuse of visas and marriage fraud.

Officials allege that a network of ‘facilitators’ charged up to 60,000 dollars to orchestrate sham marriages for foreigners with US citizens for the purpose of filing fraudulent immigrant visa applications.

“Since the foreign nationals often resided in Vietnam or China, the facilitators would then make arrangements for the US citizen petitioners to go overseas to marry the aliens,” Kice said.—AFP