Haitham Isa Saado Sad, a former employee of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services in Jordan, plead guilty to “several charges related to his role in a scheme to steal U.S. government records and defraud U.S. refugee programs.”
Sad – one of three defendants in a January 22nd indictment –plead guilty to the Department of Justice charging him with “conspiracy to steal records and defraud the United States, conspiracy to launder money, and computer fraud and abuse before U.S. District Court Judge Rudolph Contreras of the District of Columbia.”
“The indictment charges Sad and two other foreign nationals, Aws Muwafaq Abduljabbar, 42, and Olesya Leonidovna Krasilova, 43,” with the crimes listed above, all of which “relate to the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) and, in particular, the Iraq P-2 program, which allows certain Iraqis to apply directly for refugee resettlement in the United States.”
The Department of Justice notes how the defendants were former employees of Jordanian and Russian branches of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and stole “records and information” from the agency to “assist applicants in gaining admission to the United States through fraudulent means”:
According to the indictment and the statement of facts agreed to by Sad as part of his guilty plea, Sad was employed in Amman, Jordan from 2007 to 2016 by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, and Krasilova held a similar position at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, Russia. As part of their duties, both defendants had access to the State Department’s Worldwide Refugee Admissions Processing System (WRAPS), a database containing sensitive, non-public information about refugee applicants and their family members, as well as the results of security checks and internal assessments by U.S. officials regarding applications. From approximately February 2016 until at least April 2019, the three defendants, led by Abduljabbar, conspired to steal U.S. government records related to hundreds of USRAP applications. Abduljabbar organized and led the conspiracy, and he relied on and paid Sad and Krasilova to steal WRAPS records and information so that Abduljabbar could assist applicants in gaining admission to the United States through fraudulent means.
“The theft of USRAP records creates a number of risks to public safety and national security while imposing significant costs on the U.S. government, its taxpayers, and otherwise legitimate refugee applicants negatively impacted by the scheme,” the Department of Justice adds.
