Kofi Amankwaa, a former Bronx-based immigration attorney, has been sentenced to 70 months in prison for orchestrating an extensive immigration fraud scheme. The scheme involved submitting fraudulent petitions under the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) to unlawfully help clients gain U.S. immigration benefits. The sentence comes after Amankwaa pleaded guilty in September 2024, and it highlights the severe consequences of exploiting vulnerable individuals seeking legal immigration status.
From September 2016 to November 2023, Amankwaa and his associates engaged in a widespread fraud operation. They instructed clients to sign false Form I-360 VAWA Petitions, which were falsely claiming that the clients had suffered abuse from their U.S. citizen children. These claims were made under penalty of perjury, with Amankwaa himself signing the petitions as the attorney preparer.
Amankwaa’s fraudulent filings didn’t stop there. He also used the submitted VAWA petitions as a basis to obtain advance parole travel documents for his clients. These documents, which allow individuals without legal status to temporarily travel abroad and return to the U.S., were then exploited by Amankwaa to further his scheme.
Amankwaa’s scheme relied on systematically misleading his clients. He instructed them to sign petitions claiming domestic abuse that had never occurred, with the intention of falsely...
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