Immigration lawyer Ilona Dzhamgarova sentenced to 2 years in prison

Ilona Dzhamgarova and Artur Arkadyan sentenced to prison for immigration fraud. The court ruled on May 31. Dzhamgarova received 2 years in prison, and Arkadyan - 6 months. This is mentioned on US Department of Justice website.

Immigration lawyer Dzhamgarova and her husband Arkadyan owned an immigration services firm called the Dzhamgarova Firm in Brooklyn.

Dzhamgarova Firm worked with clients, mainly from the post-Soviet countries, seeking visas, asylum, citizenship and other forms of legal status in the United States. The company has advised some of its clients on how they are most likely to obtain asylum in the US, realizing that these clients are not legally eligible for asylum.

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The firm prepared and filed fraudulent asylum applications with the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). However, very often such statements referred to persecution in their home country and included false supporting documentation.

Dzhamgarova advised her clients to apply for asylum, claiming they were LGBTQ+ members and were being persecuted for this in their home country. However, she fully understood that this was a lie.

Dzhamgarova, Arkadyan and others, including co-defendant Igor Reznik, trained some clients to lie in asylum interviews. They legally represented these clients when they blatantly lied under oath during immigration proceedings.

The company, among other things, hired writers, including Reznik. They concocted asylum affidavits from clients. These testimonies contained personal histories of clients, including events and cases of alleged persecution, which were fabricated by Reznik and his accomplices.

Dzhamgarova, 46, and Arkadyan, 44, pleaded guilty on January 25, 2023 to conspiracy to commit immigration fraud. In addition to imprisonment, Dzhamgarova was sentenced to two years of supervised release, a forfeit of $540 and a fine of $000. Arkadyan was sentenced to two years of supervised release, a forfeit of $15 and a fine of $000.

Resnick, 41, from New York, who also pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit immigration fraud, will be sentenced on June 7, 2023.

As ForumDaily New York wrote earlier:

• Dzhamgarov and Arkadyan арестовали in February 2021. They were later released on bail pending trial.
• On the same day, other Russian-speaking immigration lawyers and consultants were also arrested, in particular Yulia Grinberg and Yuri Mosha. They are involved in other asylum fraud cases. In autumn 2022 Mosha pleaded guilty. You can read about how these cases are developing, when to wait for trials and sentences. here.
• The prosecutor's office demands sentence immigration lawyers Ilona Dzhamgarova and her husband Artur Arkadyan to imprisonment. The prosecution put forward such a demand after the defendants admittedwho helped clients of their law firm obtain asylum in the United States by providing false information to immigration authorities