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Judge accepts businessman’s guilty plea in CW1 scheme
U.S. District Court for the NMI Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona accepted yesterday the guilty plea of one of two owners of a company accused of engaging in fraud in connection with the applications for CNMI-Only Transitional Worker program permits.
Manglona said that last Aug. 21, U.S. Magistrate Judge Heather L. Kennedy issued findings and recommendations after a change of plea hearing in the case against Kosuke Tomokiyo.
Tomokiyo pleaded guilty to a count in the indictment that charged him with fraud and misuse of visas and permits.
After receiving no objection, Manglona accepted the guilty plea and adjudged him guilty of that offense.
Manglona set the sentencing for Jan. 18, 2019.
The final presentence report is due Jan. 8, 2019.
Kennedy, who presided over the hearing, had recommended that Manglona accept Tomokiyo’s guilty plea.
Tomokiyo signed a plea deal with the U.S. government.
Assistant U.S. attorney Eric O’Malley appeared for the U.S. government during the change of plea hearing.
According to court documents, Tomokiyo is vice president and part owner of K.C.A. Corp. His co-defendant, Mizanur Khan, who is president and part-owner of the company, is charged with four counts of fraud and misuse of visas and permits and two counts of mail fraud.
According to the indictment, on Aug. 5, 2015, Khan lied to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services that three foreign workers would be employed by K.C.A. as an “operation service worker (charcoal maker)” and that they would be employed in that capacity for 40 hours per week, for a period of one year.
On Aug. 22, 2016, Khan and Tomokiyo allegedly lied to USCIS that Tomokiyo had previously been and was to be employed by K.C.A. as a “sales manager,” and that Tomokiyo had been employed in that capacity since January 2016.
