Texas Man Found Guilty in Passport Fraud CaseU.S. Department of JusticeHouston, TX April 10, 2007 Jury Convicts Houston Man Of Passport Fraud And Obstruction of Justice A jury has returned its verdict convicting James Maceo Ramey, 60, of Houston, Texas, also known as “Joe Hill”, an attorney, to his employees, of multiple counts of passport fraud, false statements to federal officials, and obstruction of justice, United States Attorney Don DeGabrielle announced today. At approximately 7:00 p.m. on Monday, April 9, 2007, after a federal jury returned its verdicts finding Ramey guilty of one count of passport fraud, two counts of making false statements to federal passport officials, and three counts of obstruction of justice, United States District Judge Lee H. Rosenthal granted the government’s motion to revoke Ramey’s pretrial bond and ordered him taken immediately into federal custody pending his sentencing in September. Ramey faces a maximum sentence of up to 10 years in federal prison without parole for the passport fraud conviction, 5 years in federal prison on each count of making false statements to federal passport officials, and 10 yeas in prison for each of the obstruction of justice counts of conviction. Each of the six counts also carries a maximum fine of $250,000. During the four-day trial, the United States presented evidence which proved that between 2002 and 2006 Ramey filed an estimated total of 15 bankruptcies around the United States, including four that are still active in Texas bankruptcy courts. As a result of Ramey’s repeated failures to comply with numerous bankruptcy court orders, the bankruptcy judge presiding over all four of Ramey’s local cases ordered all of Ramey’s assets and records seized by the U.S. Marshals Service in November 2003. Among the items seized were Ramey’s U. S. passport from a locked safe that had to be drilled open. A few days after the court ordered seizure, Ramey applied for a replacement passport, swearing in an affidavit to the local passport officials that his previous passport has been “lost”. Along with the false passport replacement application, Ramey also submitted a letter on the letterhead of one of his companies, “Manhattan Gold Inc.”, asking the State Department for expedited passport issuance claiming impending international travel associated with the alleged buying of a gold mine in Africa. The letter contained the forged signature of a real person, a U.S. citizen living overseas, who knew nothing of the forging of her signature nor that she has been named as an officer of one of Ramey’s other companies. The replacement passport was issued to Ramey and picked up by him in early December 2003. Ramey’s former attorney in this criminal case, who became a fact witness in the case and therefore disqualified from his continued representation of Ramey, testified during trial that after the seizure of Ramey’s original passport, Ramey had told him that he [Ramey] already had at least one new passport and that more passports were easy to get. After more failures to comply with various orders of the bankruptcy court, the bankruptcy court judge issued an arrest warrant for Ramey. In November 2003, deputy U.S. Marshals went to Ramey’s house to execute the arrest warrant. After a 30 minute careful search of the house, Ramey was found hiding inside an air-conditioning return air vent that had been screwed shut from the outside. He was then arrested on the warrant. After the State Department discovered that Ramey’s replacement passport had been fraudulently issued to him, a search warrant was executed at Ramey’s house to find the fraudulently issued replacement passport. It was not and has still not been found. The missing passport is the principle fact supporting the government’s motion urged immediately following the jury’s verdict to revoke Ramey’s bond. The investigation leading to the charges was conducted by the Houston offices of the U.S. Marshals Service and the U.S. State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service and the Texas City office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The case was prosecuted and tried by Assistant United States Attorneys Mike Schultz and Joseph Magliolo. Contact:
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