New York man is facing various conspiracy charges, officials announced.
U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman, seen in a file photo, announced the charges Monday. (Luke Nozicka | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com)NEWARK -- A business owner was arrested Monday on charges he hired foreign workers at his IT companies, and scammed them out of the full-time salaries their visas required.
Sowrabh Sharma, 31, of New York and the two IT companies he partly owns - SCM Data Inc., of New Jersey, and MMC Systems Inc., of Virginia - were charged with conspiracy to commit visa fraud and to obstruct justice, and conspiracy to harbor aliens, according to an announcement from U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman. The companies' head of finance, Shikha Mohta, 33, of Jersey City, also faces the same charges.
Sharma and the others allegedly carried out the scam by recruiting student visa holders, recent college graduates, and other foreign nationals to jobs in the company, and then sponsoring them to obtain H-1B visas, Fishman said.
The H1-B visas allow U.S. employers to temporarily hire expert foreign workers, as long as they are full-time employees who are paid annual, non per-diem salaries. The two companies recruited and hired the foreign workers to act as consultants to their clients' businesses, authorities said.
2 IT employees charged in scheme
Sharma, Mohta, and others at the company allegedly created false payroll records that reflected full-time salaries, while really paying the foreign employees less, Fishman said.
During a U.S. Department of Labor audit, Fishman said the group is accused of creating phony leave and vacation slips to explain why employees who were supposed to be working full-time were not.
Instead, authorities allege, the employees were "benched" without pay, a violation of the visa. They were only getting paid while they were on assignment at a client's business, officials said.
The five-year scam was aimed at saving on labor costs, authorities said.
Sharma is scheduled to make an initial appearance Monday afternoon in Newark federal court.
Mohta and another employee appeared in court last year on similar charges. Sharma is facing a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison and $500,000 in fines if convicted of the charges, officials said.
Jessica Mazzola may be reached at jmazzola@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @JessMazzola. Find NJ.com on Facebook.