Thaindian News

DENVER, COLORADO (BNO NEWS) – A Boulder, Colorado man was indicted last Wednesday for several immigration related charges, Jeff Dorschner Spokesman of the U.S. Department of Justice said Friday.

Opas Sinprasong, age 51, of Boulder, Colorado was a citizen of Thailand, running Thai and Japanese restaurants in Boulder, Louisville, and Broomfield. He was indicted by a federal grand jury in Denver on charges of defrauding his foreign national employees, harboring illegal aliens, and other immigration and tax related charges.

Sinprasong sponsored Thai nationals’ admission to the United States as specialty workers for his restaurants from 2001 to 2008, claiming that the efficiency of his business operations depended on these workers with specialized skills.

In order to recieve his sponsorships, Sinprasong required employees to pay approximately $1,500 U.S. dollars, a penalty of around $18,000 U.S. dollars if they violated the contract or caused damage to Sinprasong, and a $3,000 dollar “visa preparation fee”, among other conditions that were enforced. These amounts were calculated in Thai baht and are substantial sums of money for Thai nationals.

Employees received their payments “under-the-table” for the first three or four months as they paid their fees. After they had completed their payments which were deducted from their wages, Sinprasong helped the Thai employees obtain Social Security numbers, placing them on the official payroll and reporting a portion of their wages.

Sinprasong allegedly tried to defraud the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the Thai employees, concealing the considerable overtime hours he ordered the Thai employees to work, typically between 26 and 32 hours of overtime each week. Not only did he not report overtime wages to the IRS, he also failed to pay his Thai employees those extra hours.

Sinprasong turned himself in Thursday, making his initial appearance in U.S. District Court in Denver.

“Greed is the primary reason anyone unlawfully harbors illegal aliens,” said Kumar Kibble, special agent in charge of the ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) Office of Investigations in Denver. “These criminals either cheat the aliens they harbor and/or they cheat their competitors,” he added.

Sinprasong is facing a maximum prison term of 20 years for each count of wire fraud, 5 years maximum for each count of failure to pay employee federal payroll taxes, 10 years for each count of false swearing in an immigration matter, and 10 years for each count of harboring illegal aliens. Additionally, each count has a maximum fine of $250,000.