TWO U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT EMPLOYEES PLEAD GUILTY
IN BRIBES-FOR-VISAS SCHEME

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Assistant Attorney General Christopher A. Wray of the Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney McGregor W. Scott of the Eastern District of California announced today that a career State Department employee and her husband, a former consular employee at the U.S. Embassy in Sri Lanka, have pleaded guilty to charges of bribery and visa fraud in connection with the issuance of visas out of Sri Lanka.

Long N. Lee, 52, a U.S. State Department Foreign Service Officer and career State Department employee, and her husband Acey R. Johnson, who was until recently a Consular Associate employed in the consular section of the U.S. Embassy in Sri Lanka, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Sacramento today to one count each of conspiring to defraud the United States, to accept bribes, and to commit visa fraud; to one count of defrauding the United States of a duty of honest services; and to one count of receiving bribes. Defendants Lee and Johnson, who agreed to cooperate with the government's ongoing investigation, were the sixth and seventh defendants to plead guilty in the case. Pursuant to their plea agreements, they each face a minimum of at least five years in prison, a three-year term of supervised release, and a substantial fine. They also agreed to forfeit to the United States two homes, one located in Oregon and one in Colorado; approximately $361,766, including funds seized from bank accounts in Oregon, Virginia, Washington and California; and nearly $90,000 in cash recovered from their home in Oregon and from the pillows of a love seat they owned in Sri Lanka. Sentencing is scheduled for July 16, 2004.

Lee, who was the Chief Administrative Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Sri Lanka from 2000 to 2003, had previously served at U.S. Embassies in Fiji, Vietnam and Cape Verde. Johnson had worked as a Consular Associate in the U.S. Embassies in Sri Lanka and Fiji. As a Consular Associate, he was responsible for processing visa applications and issuing visas to foreign nationals.

Lee and Johnson admitted in their plea agreements that Lee agreed to arrange for the issuance of U.S. visas in exchange for bribes as early as 1995. From that period through early 2003, Lee and Johnson accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribe payments from “visa brokers,” and issued visas to scores of foreign nationals, primarily from India and Vietnam. On instructions from Lee and Johnson, the bribe payments were broken into transactions under $10,000 to avoid scrutiny, and were paid in a variety of methods - deposits into various bank accounts, payments to family members, and deliveries of cash. The bribe payments were made by visa brokers located in Sacramento, Virginia, and in southern California, who recruited foreign national clients who wanted to come to the United States.

According to the plea agreements, the visa brokers, for a substantial fee, then steered the foreign nationals through the visa application process, including travel to the U.S. Embassies where Lee and Johnson issued visas, and arranged the bribe payments.

A total of 11 defendants have been charged in the case. In addition to the guilty pleas entered today, five visa broker defendants - brothers Vinesh Prasad, 33, and Minesh Prasad, 28, of Sacramento, California; Rajwant S. Virk, 46, of Herndon, Virginia; Rachhpal Singh, 32, of Newark, Californial; and Ramesh K. Jaisingh, 57, of Fairfax, Virginia - have previously entered guilty pleas. A jury trial for three defendants - Narinderjit Singh Bhullar, 40, of Sacramento, Kim Chi Lam, of Gardena, California, and Phuong-Hien Lam Trinh, 35, of Gardena, California - is scheduled for Aug. 24, 2004. An eleventh defendant is a fugitive, believed to be in India.

The case is being prosecuted in U.S. District Court in Sacramento by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Benjamin B. Wagner and S. Robert Tice-Raskin of the U.S. Attorney's Office, and Trial Attorney Noah D. Bookbinder of the Public Integrity Section, headed by Noel L. Hillman, Chief.

“Consular employees are entrusted with preserving the integrity of the visa process and keeping our borders safe and secure,” said Assistant Attorney General Wray of the Criminal Division. “The Department of Justice will not hesitate to investigate and prosecute cases where government employees betrayed that trust for their own personal profit.”

U.S. Attorney Scott said, “In these extraordinary times, it is more important than ever to ensure absolute integrity in the granting of United States visas. This breach of trust by two of our fellow citizens is both disheartening and reprehensible.”

Assistant Secretary of State Francis X. Taylor, Bureau of Diplomatic Security and Director of the Office of Foreign Missions, said: “The State Department takes seriously its responsibilities to protect the integrity of the U.S. passport and visa, the most sought after travel documents in the world. We will aggressively pursue those employees that seek to corrupt the system.”

The case is the product of an extensive investigation conducted by the Diplomatic Security Service of the U.S. Department of State, and by agents with the FBI and several other state and federal agencies associated with the Joint Terrorism Task Force for the Eastern District of California, including the California Bureau of Investigation, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, and the Bureau of Immigration Control and Enforcement of the Department of Homeland Security. Sri Lankan law enforcement authorities also provided assistance in the investigation. The case was initially indicted on May 1, 2003, following an undercover investigation in Sri Lanka, surveillance and other investigation in Sacramento, Southern California and northern Virginia.

The Department of Justice and the United States Attorney's Office noted that the indictment is only an accusation, and that the remaining defendants are presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty.

###

04-285