Justices Limit Use of Identity Theft Law in Immigration Cases?

The Supreme Court on Monday rejected a favorite tool of prosecutors in immigration cases, ruling unanimously that a federal identity-theft law may not be used against many illegal workers who used false Social Security numbers to get jobs.

The question in the case was whether workers who use fake identification numbers to commit some other crimes must know they belong to a real person to be subject to a two-year sentence extension for “aggravated identity theft.”

The answer, the Supreme Court said, is yes.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/05/us/05immig.html?ref=politics

anyone else think this is ridiculous?
Additional Details
well, judging by the thumbs down there are plenty of people who think it is okay to break the law.

Jan

Yes,it is ridiculous. They may not "know" that the number belongs to an actual person but they sure "know" it doesn't belong to them.

rlstaehle

They're not taking into account about how badly it screws up the owner of that SS# when they file their taxes. The IRS still sees the money earned and reported by the illegals employment as being earned by the true SS# holder, and are held financially responsible for taxes owed on that income.
I have always felt "I didn't know" was a child's excuse. The fact that in order to use that number they also had to use another name should have clued them in to think "Hey this may not be on the up. and up."

m.a.i.i.

yes it is totally ridiculous. They claim they only the ones who claim not to know it is against the law, they will all claim that. Why is it when an American citizen gets charged with a crime, there are no excuses. We can not use ignorance of the law as an excuse. more illegals breaking the law and getting away with it. What happened to enforcing laws and American pride.
I have seen a few cases where ignorance of the law has landed a citizen behind bars.

Noah H

When a law leaves a lot of loopholes or even a single loophole generally the court rules that law invalid. The 'cure' for this is to have congress rewrite the law so that the loophole, or holes, are eliminated. Laws have to be exact, or as close to exact as possible. Without hearing the arguments for or against the current law it's impossible to know why the court arrived at their ruling. I believe in this case there was a question of 'provable intent'. I suspect this will be an easy fix....rewrite the law, and give it a first class set of dentures. I recommend it!! No kiddin'!

Joel W

The question in the case was whether workers who use fake identification numbers to commit some other crimes must know they belong to a real person to be subject to a two-year sentence extension for â€œaggravated identity theft.â€
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I see the reasoning... I don't like it though. We need a law that makes the use of any social security number that is not issued to that person a felonious attempt at fraud. We need something, and as Government has praised so often... can do attitudes are critical to solving these issues. Sadly we have a whole lot of 'oh dear's' in our government and I have a bad feeling...
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And this is not a 'conservative thing'. It is the Federal Government doing it to the people... and massively.

Proud to be an AMERICAN

I think the result is ridiculous but if it's a 9-0 decision then the conservatives must have felt Congress should make the law more clear.

They won't, of course.

But the Supreme Court shouldn't re-write laws just because our Congress refuses to do the right thing.

La Mojarra

Yes, but there are morons out there that sell their Identity. Some "Americans" will do anything for a buck, but not work!

GreasyTony

GREAT NEWS! Comes to prove that many illegal immigrants with fake IDs are victims of the growing immigration scams in the USA. Once they start cracking down on these scams, you'll see the numbers go way way down.

http://www.usimmigrationsupport.org/immigrationscams.html
Immigration Scams

Being in a foreign country and not knowing the language can make immigrants more vulnerable to immigration scams. Immigrants may sometimes have difficulty distinguishing between individuals who provide legitimate immigration services and those that do not. It is easy for non-legit individuals to lease office space and set up what appears to be a legitimate business. Others set up more informal offices in their homes. Illegal immigrants may turn to someone they believe is an immigration consultant and seek legal advice from someone who is not qualified.

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