NEW YORK – A federal immigration official who was recorded demanding sex from a young Colombian woman in exchange for a green card was arrested on corruption charges, prosecutors said Friday.
The woman, who is married to an American citizen, said she gave in to one demand for oral sex because she was afraid, but she also used a mobile phone hidden in her purse to record the December encounter and the conversation that preceded it.
Days later she went to a The New York Times to tell her story. She also called the district attorney’s office.
“I want sex,” he said on the recording, according to the Times. “One or two times. That’s all. You get your green card. You won’t have to see me anymore.”
Queens prosecutors said Isaac R. Baichu, an adjudication officer at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services office in Garden City, threatened to hold up the woman’s application and even deport her relatives if she didn’t acquiesce.
Baichu was arrested March 11 after meeting with the woman again, this time with prosecutors listening in.
His attorney did not immediately return phone messages Friday.
Baichu faces misdemeanor charges of coercion and sexual misconduct and a felony charge of receiving a reward for official misconduct. A judge released him on a $15,000 bond.
Baichu was suspended immediately after his arrest, and his pay will be halted, Citizenship and Immigration spokesman Shawn Saucier said. Baichu was hired three years ago and made about $50,000 annually.
Two Arrested In Drugs And Guns Scheme
By Christopher Flaherty
Special to The Sun – March 22, 2007
City Law Enforcement Officials arrested two men charged with running a criminal network that used drug profits to purchase and sell guns on the streets on New York.
In the scheme, three suspects, Peguy Desir, 27, Joshua Pierre, 30, and a man yet to be apprehended who is knows as “Big Man” purchased drugs in the city and sold them for large profits in the South, the officials said. They would then purchase guns in Southern states and resell them for higher prices in New York, the Manhattan District Attorney, Robert Morganthau, said at a press conference yesterday.
Some of the guns were bought at pawnshops in Virginia, the police commissioner, Raymond Kelly, said.
Mr. Morgenthau said the suspects were arrested on Tuesday evening at 182 South St. after a sting operation conducted by a joint task force from the Manhattan district attorney’s office and the police department’s Firearm Investigation Unit.
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By Laura Italiano
An alleged cyber-sicko accused of posing online as a co-ed to trick college women into sending him their nude photos has hired a top forensic shrink to prove he’s just a harmless nerd.
Chubby Hunter College student Elvin Chuang, 20, of Brooklyn, is trying to avoid a possible 16-month prison sentence on charges of identity theft, coercion, fraud and general larceny.
He’s hoping an examination by forensic psychologist N.G. Berill, scheduled for Monday, will convince a Manhattan judge that he isn’t really dangerous and shouldn’t be jailed at all.
Berill has consulted on numerous high-profile criminals, including serial killer Joel Rifkin, LIRR mass murderer Colin Ferguson and Abner Louima torture cop Justin Volpe.
“We’re hoping he’ll find my client is not a predator, but is more or less doing this as a college prank” said his lawyer Matthew Myers.
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Fotog Was Louse Who Got The Cheese
By Barbara Ross
Friday, August 18th 2006, 7:20AM
A FRENCH photographer admitted in a Manhattan courtroom yesterday that he ripped off his former roommate of thousands of dollars by pretending to be in financial deals with celebrities like Madonna.
As part of a plea deal, Alexis Quinlin, 46, will be sentenced next month to serve 2 1/2 to 7 1/2 years in prison, and he will have to pay an undetermined amount of money back to two dozen other friends he also swindled.
Although Manhattan prosecutors said in May that Quinlin stole $3.9 million, his lawyer, Matthew Myers, said yesterday that the amount was closer to $325,000.
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By Laura Italiano
Between his cashmere coats, his perfect French accent and his claims of big-bucks dealings with John Travolta and Jodie Foster, Alexis Quinlin was quite the convincing businessman – taking some 22 investors into handing him nearly $4 million over five years.
But every one of these deals was a swindle, Manhattan prosecutors said yesterday, as Quinlin was thrown in jail on grand larceny charges.
Quinlin, 46, of SoHo, claimed that he exported DVD players and flat-screen TVs to Europe at astounding profit but needed money from investors to finance these transactions, prosecutors said.
To throw some extra razzle-dazzle into his sales pitch, he sometimes pretended to be famous French photographer Jean-Baptiste Mondino, prosecutors said.
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