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It’s Easy to Buy an Identity
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The Mexican Independence Day parade on 26th Street (Photo by Chris Diers) |
Immigration remains a live issue in the presidential campaign. This election cycle, a lot of attention is focusing on whether immigrants should get drivers licenses. Coming up with a convincing ID is often the key for illegal immigrants looking to work and live in the United States. That may mean stealing or buying false identification. In December, Oscar Ayala-Cornejo was deported after authorities learned he had taken on the identity of a cousin from Chicago who was dead. With his cousin’s name and social security number, Ayala Cornejo became a police officer in Milwaukee. More recently, a west Chicago man was arrested. News reports say he’d used somebody else’s social security number to land a job, buy a home and get cell phone service. While identity fraud might seem like a clear-cut violation and crime to most of us, not everyone thinks about it that way. Chicago Public Radio’s Alexandra Salomon has more.
26th Street is the heart of the Little Village neighborhood.
ambi: 26th Street noise
The street is bustling with families doing their weekend shopping.
ambi: 26th Street noise
They say it’s pretty easy to buy a social security card here. People who sell identity documents, green cards, social security cards, they make themselves known through a hand signal. You can bring someone else’s information and get one made up. You can find just about anything here. You just need to ask around.
That’s what Lupe did when she arrived here from Mexico.
LUPE: [Es facil porque…] It’s easy. There are lots of sellers. They’re everywhere.
She paid $50 for a phony social security card. Then she got a job in a school cafeteria where she worked for nine years. But last November she was fired after her employer received a letter from the social security administration saying that the number she’d provided didn’t not match the name she used. She was devastated.
LUPE: [Es su futuro de uno…] It’s your future and then all of a sudden you lose it and the whole world seems to come down around you.
Lupe is a tiny woman. She keeps her bible and her rosary nearby. She spends a lot of time praying since she lost her job.
Lupe says her boss knew she had used a fake social security number. He told her she could have her job back if she could find a friend or a relative who’d be willing to lend her a real one. And a friend, a US citizen who had moved back to Mexico, offered her just that.
LUPE: [Pero le digo no, no…] But I told her no. I don’t want both of us to have problems.
Lupe came here because she wasn’t able to support her family in Mexico after her husband passed away.
There are nearly 12 million illegal immigrants living in the United States. People like Lupe. They’re here. They want to work. So they’ll do whatever it takes to obtain a social security number: borrowing it from relatives, renting it from friends, using the number of someone who is deceased or purchasing it on the street.
GUTIERREZ: It is fairly easy if you know where to go to go ahead and go purchase one of these fake numbers because again when you talk about supply and demand the necessity of people to work and provide for their families is so great there is always some somebody going to be there that is going to help to try to provide that for themselves.
Luis Gutierrez works for the immigrant rights group Latinos Progresandos. He says many illegal immigrants have no idea that what they are doing is actually a crime. In fact, it’s quite the opposite.
GUTIERREZ: They see this as just a step in the direction of legalizing themselves. They think to themselves if they get a job and they pay their taxes and they do all the things that you’re supposed to do then you at some point can legalize if you stay out of trouble and don’t commit any crimes. They don’t see buying a phony social security number to get a job as awful and bad and as breaking the law.
But identity fraud is a felony. And these are crimes that Immigration and Customs Enforcement is making a priority says spokeswoman Gail Montenegro.
MONTENEGRO: We are focusing on bringing criminal charges against employers who are knowingly breaking the law and we find that the prospect of ten years in jail for harboring illegal aliens or for conspiracy or for aggravated identity theft has much greater teeth than an administrative fine for paperwork violations.
Montenegro says it’s also a security issue because these documents sold on the street aren’t just used by illegal workers seeking employment. They’re also used by criminals. Many of the 9/11 terrorists had fraudently obtained identity documents that allowed them to board commercial aircraft.
MONTENGRO: The organizations that operate and manufacture these fake documents, we know that they don’t care who they sell these documents to. For them it’s a business, it’s all about money and they don’t care if they’re selling documents to someone who has nefarious plans to harm the citizens of the United States.
She also says that in many instances illegal immigrants are also being victimized by those who traffic in identity documents.
MONTENEGRO: In many cases the illegal worker is told that they are using the identity of somebody who is no longer in the United States, that is no longer working anymore, that it’s not going to affect this person.
And Gutierrez says that when they do go out on the street to buy a document, in most cases they think they’re buying a fake one.
GUTIERREZ: For the most part they are not going out there and asking for someone else’s social security number that they can use that belongs to another person.
But some of those numbers are stolen. And even when the person purchasing a social security number or identity document believes it won’t do any harm, there can be victims on the other side that can find their lives turned upside down.
Linda Foley is the founder of the Identity Theft Resource Center, a non profit organization dedicated to preventing identity theft. She’s also been a victim of identity. She says it can take years for someone to clear up their name and the burden is on the victim.
FOLEY: You’ll get collection notices or calls from collection agencies. You may get denied credit. You may get arrested when you do a rolling stop at a stop sign because there are additional warrants for your arrest that you didn’t know about. Instead of getting a tax refund you may get a notice saying you owe us more money if someone is working as you. Or if you apply for benefits you may get those denied because someone in Montana is working in your name.
She has seen welfare payments denied and insurance premiums increased because the person using the stolen social security number was in an accident.
Often the same social security number is sold to multiple people, sometimes as many as twenty. And trying to clear up your name with the credit agencies or the Internal Revenue Service can be a difficult battle that can take a toll emotionally.
FOLEY: Some people go into a depression, a sense of I’ve lost everything. We have had a number of people who have committed suicide over this.
Foley says that it’s difficult for the government agencies to track this kind of identity theft.
A spokeswoman for the social security administration says the agency does not keep track of the use of social security numbers by illegal immigrants. She says the agency has no way of knowing how many of the incorrect earnings reports that it receives each year come from immigrants that are working here unlawfully.
Gutierrez believes the problem will continue until the immigration system is reformed. And for people like Lupe, those who sell these documents are serving a need.
LUPE: [Ellos los hacen para ayudarnos…] They do this to help us and they do this so they can have bread to eat everyday. I don’t believe that they’re criminals. The situation pushes people to extremes.
In the meantime, illegal workers using phony social security numbers are contributing to the country’s public benefits system.
Social Security maintains a record of all the wages earned by people whose names do not match the social security number reported on their W-2 forms. It’s known as the Earnings Suspense File and it totals more than $585 billion in reported wages. And it’s growing.
I’m Alexandra Salomon, Chicago Public Radio.
Music Button: Booka Shade, “Karasu” from the CD DJ-Kicks (!K7 records)
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