A senior United States immigration official was jailed yesterday for three years and four months for his role in a scam to sell forged Honduran passports to businessmen and criminals.
Jerry Stuchiner, whose service with the Immigration and Naturalisation Service included a five-year posting at the US Consulate in Hong Kong, admitted possessing forged, false or unlawfully obtained travel documents.
Judge Clare Marie Beeson told the District Court the offence was a 'gross and serious breach of trust' because Stuchiner had abused his position to obtain the passports.
The judge said Stuchiner, 45, who had been in the service for nearly 21 years, must have known the damage caused by the trade in fake travel documents.
'Hong Kong has sufficient immigration problems to deal with without it becoming a trading point for false passports,' Judge Beeson said.
The judge said there was no real reason given for the crime but she believed the defendant would have been paid a lot of money because of the great danger involved.
