- Dec 18, 2011
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This is outrageous!! Liberal judges saying that using a stolen SSN with your own name is not a crime. That means millions of illegal aliens have the right to financially ruin citizens, and liberal judges will let them off the hook. Just peachy!! Just don't try it if you are a citizen. I think this is another one of those perks exclusive to illegal aliens. Just like the post office offering a service so they can send billions out of our country each year to help Mexico's economy.
"Is using a forged Social Security Number -- but your own name -- to obtain employment or buy a car an identity theft crime? Lately, U.S. courts are saying it's not.
The most recent judicial body to take on the issue, the Colorado Supreme Court, ruled last month that a man who used his real name but someone else's Social Security number to obtain a car loan was not guilty of "criminal impersonation," overturning convictions by lower courts.
That follows a ruling last year by the U.S. Supreme Court that a Mexican man who gave a false SSN to get a job at an Illinois steel plant could not be convicted under federal identity theft laws because he did not knowingly use another person's identifying number. The ruling overturned an opinion by a federal appeals court in St. Louis -- and contradicted earlier findings by circuit courts in the Southeast, upper Midwest and the Gulf states.
It hasn’t been a shutout for identity theft prosecutors, however. In July, an Iowa state appeals court came to the opposite conclusion, affirming a lower court decision that a man who used a California woman's SSN to obtain employment was guilty of breaking that state's identity theft law.
Identity theft can take many forms, but one of the most vexing is so-called "SSN-only" ID theft. In it, an imposter uses a victim's SSN --- sometimes purchased from a broker, sometimes nine digits pulled out of thin air -- to obtain credit or to provide necessary documentation to obtain work. In many cases, SSN "borrowing" is successful and the imposter goes undetected for years.
At the heart of all these cases is a simple question: Does the mere use of an anonymous victim's SSN break identity theft laws?
Mari Frank, a California-based lawyer and identity theft victim advocate, said courts are failing to recognize the real harm caused by imposters, even if imposters are unaware of that harm.
"You can't say there's no victim,” she said. “That Colorado ruling really aggravated me," she said. Courts are mis-applying impersonation laws, and that could really hurt victims. "(The judges) just don't get it."
Immigrant advocates vs. ID theft victim advocates
Many of the recent cases stem from a series of raids conducted by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement service at meat-packing plants in the Midwest during the waning days of the Bush administration. Prosecutors got in the habit of using federal identity theft laws to seek a mandatory two-year felony sentence enhancement for convicted suspects, and used that threat as bargaining tool to push suspects into plea bargains. But the 2009 Supreme Court ruling essentially took that bargaining tool away from prosecutors.
The issue pits immigration rights advocates -- who say that undocumented workers are fundamentally different from identity criminals trying to steal credit -- against identity theft victim advocates, who think tougher imposter laws are needed."
Courts: Using another's SSN not a crime - NBC News
"Is using a forged Social Security Number -- but your own name -- to obtain employment or buy a car an identity theft crime? Lately, U.S. courts are saying it's not.
The most recent judicial body to take on the issue, the Colorado Supreme Court, ruled last month that a man who used his real name but someone else's Social Security number to obtain a car loan was not guilty of "criminal impersonation," overturning convictions by lower courts.
That follows a ruling last year by the U.S. Supreme Court that a Mexican man who gave a false SSN to get a job at an Illinois steel plant could not be convicted under federal identity theft laws because he did not knowingly use another person's identifying number. The ruling overturned an opinion by a federal appeals court in St. Louis -- and contradicted earlier findings by circuit courts in the Southeast, upper Midwest and the Gulf states.
It hasn’t been a shutout for identity theft prosecutors, however. In July, an Iowa state appeals court came to the opposite conclusion, affirming a lower court decision that a man who used a California woman's SSN to obtain employment was guilty of breaking that state's identity theft law.
Identity theft can take many forms, but one of the most vexing is so-called "SSN-only" ID theft. In it, an imposter uses a victim's SSN --- sometimes purchased from a broker, sometimes nine digits pulled out of thin air -- to obtain credit or to provide necessary documentation to obtain work. In many cases, SSN "borrowing" is successful and the imposter goes undetected for years.
At the heart of all these cases is a simple question: Does the mere use of an anonymous victim's SSN break identity theft laws?
Mari Frank, a California-based lawyer and identity theft victim advocate, said courts are failing to recognize the real harm caused by imposters, even if imposters are unaware of that harm.
"You can't say there's no victim,” she said. “That Colorado ruling really aggravated me," she said. Courts are mis-applying impersonation laws, and that could really hurt victims. "(The judges) just don't get it."
Immigrant advocates vs. ID theft victim advocates
Many of the recent cases stem from a series of raids conducted by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement service at meat-packing plants in the Midwest during the waning days of the Bush administration. Prosecutors got in the habit of using federal identity theft laws to seek a mandatory two-year felony sentence enhancement for convicted suspects, and used that threat as bargaining tool to push suspects into plea bargains. But the 2009 Supreme Court ruling essentially took that bargaining tool away from prosecutors.
The issue pits immigration rights advocates -- who say that undocumented workers are fundamentally different from identity criminals trying to steal credit -- against identity theft victim advocates, who think tougher imposter laws are needed."
Courts: Using another's SSN not a crime - NBC News