Federal authorities announced charges Wednesday against six people they said were part of a major marriage fraud ring in Massachusetts that charged immigrants as much as $40,000 and set them up in sham unions with American citizens so they could get quick legal status here.
Jennifer Gonzalez, a U.S. citizen, was charged as the ringleader, overseeing 18 to 20 bogus marriages a year for more than 10 years. Authorities said she was also a customer, having entered into her own sham marriage with an illegal immigrant, even though she still referred to another man — the father of her children — as her husband.
Ms. Gonzalez also collected at least $124,500 in food stamps, while hiding the millions her sham marriage operation was earning, and also hiding the existence of her husband and her children’s father, said Leah Foley, the U.S. attorney in Massachusetts.
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She called the fraud ring an affront to those trying to come to the U.S. the right way.
“Every single day, thousands of hardworking people are going through the immigration process legally and properly,” she said. “To see a for-profit business whose sole purpose is helping people cheat and skip the line by simply paying for it must be so offensive and disheartening.”
Charged with Ms. Gonzalez are Erica Daniels, Cherice Alejandro, Amara Pugh, Jessica Tavares and Jaylin Hill.
Authorities said they were tipped off to the scam by a Brazilian citizen who had sought to use Ms. Gonzalez’s operation.
The Brazilian said he had entered into a sham marriage with Ms. Daniels.
Investigators also sent an undercover operative in to get set up for a sham marriage to Ms. Alejandro. They said Ms. Alejandro had two previous marriages to illegal immigrants as well, and in both cases applied with Homeland Security to obtain legal status for those previous spouses.
Ms. Gonzalez said she curtailed her operations at the end of the Biden administration, saying her husband had become ill in 2024 but she also worried that “Trump was becoming a president” and had “a lot of immigration powers.”
“I didn’t work in 2025 because immigration was a little bit harsh,” she said in one conversation with the undercover operative, which authorities recorded.
The Brazilian man said Ms. Gonzalez charged $5,000 up front and $500 a month while the sham marriage continued.
Ms. Daniels filed an application with DHS seeking to give legal immigrant status to the men, but the citizenship agency was suspicious about the union. Ms. Daniels canceled the petition last year.
Ms. Gonzalez saw her price tag as worth the service she was selling.
“I’m here for you to get the American Dream and keep on moving and do what you wanna do in life,” she told the undercover operative, assuring him that “in the end it’s going to be worth every single dollar.”
Ms. Tavares and Mr. Hill are also accused of entering into sham marriages.
Ms. Pugh was described as Ms. Gonzalez’s secretary.
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