Mexican Woman Sentenced for Passport Fraud

United States Attorney Deborah R. Gilg announced that Marcela Vallin Barajas, age 42 of Omaha, Nebraska, was sentenced after having previously pled guilty to providing a false statement in an application for a passport and falsely representing a Social Security number to be hers.  The Honorable Joseph F. Bataillon sentenced Barajas to time served, after she had been in custody since August 21, 2014.  She will be deported.

Barajas is in the United States illegally.  She first applied for and obtained a passport using a Texas woman’s name and Social Security number in 2002.  From 2002 through 2011 she used the passport for travel from the United States to Mexico 10 times.  On November 26, 2012, Barajas applied for a renewal passport in the same name using the same number and a passport was subsequently issued to her.  As part of the application, she stated the Texas woman’s name was hers and declared under penalty of perjury that she was a citizen or non-citizen national of the United States.

The case was investigated by the Homeland Security Investigations and the U.S. Department of State Diplomatic Security Service.