A New York-based Guyanese working as an adjudicator in an office of the US Citizen and Immigration Services has pleaded not guilty to promising to secure immigration papers for a Colombian woman in exchange for sexual favours, the New York Times (NYT) reported on Friday.
Isaac R. Baichu, 46, who became a US citizen in 1991, handled about 8,000 green card applications during his three-year tenure as an adjudicator at the Garden City, New York office. He recently pleaded not guilty to felony and misdemeanour charges and faces up to seven years in prison if convicted.
According to the NYT, Baichu had told the married 22-year-old Colombian woman at her green card interview in December last year that there was no problem so far with her application and he also at that time asked for her mobile number.
The Times said he then began to call her and allegedly demanded sex, warning that he could ruin her life and have her relatives deported.
Afraid to report to the police because she feared deportation she took her story to the NYT and then to the Queens, New York district attorney.
On December 21, the Times said she met Baichu in a parked car on Queens Boulevard where he asked for sex not realizing that she was recording everything on her cell phone.
At another meeting, she said, he demanded oral sex and she gave in.
The NYT said that his agency has since suspended him with pay and is reviewing his other cases. Prosecutors also said that they recorded a meeting between Baichu and the woman on March 11 this year at which he made similar demands for sex and they suspect there are other victims.
According to the NYT, the Baichu case points to the wide power of low-level immigration law enforcers and the growing desperation of immigrants seeking legal status.
Citing other cases of sexual coercion by immigration law enforcers which have surfaced in recent years, the report said this raises broader questions about the “system’s vulnerability to corruption at a time when millions of non-citizens live in a kind of legal no-man’s land, increasingly fearful of seeking the law’s protection.”
Describing the taped meeting between Baichu and the woman, the NYT reported that two family members said they watched anxiously from their parked car as the Colombian disappeared behind the tinted windows of his red Lexus.
The NYT said as the recorder taped the agent’s words in his Guyanese accent, he laid out his terms “in an easy, almost paternal style.
He would not ask too much, he said: sex ‘once or twice,’ visits to his home in the Bronx, perhaps a link to other Colombians who needed his help with their immigration problems.
In shaky English, the woman expressed reluctance, and questioned how she could be sure he would keep his word.
“If I do it, it’s like very hard for me, because I have my husband, and I really fall in love with him,'” she said, according to the NYT.
Baichu then insisted that she had to trust him. NYT: “`I wouldn’t ask you to do something for me if I can’t do something for you, right?’ he said, and reasoned, `Nobody going to help you for nothing,’ noting that she had no money.
“He described himself as the single father of a 10-year-old daughter, telling her, ‘I need love, too,’ and predicting, ‘You will get to like me because I’m a nice guy.'”
The NYT said that Baichu, who earned about US$50,000 a year, was arrested as he emerged from a diner and headed to his car, wearing much gold and diamond jewellery.
Released on US $15,000 bail, Baichu referred calls for comment to his lawyer, Sally Attia, who said he did not have authority to grant or deny green card petitions without his supervisor’s approval, the NYT said.
