Phony Immigration Agent Loses Challenge to Five-Year Sentence

A man who posed as a federal immigration agent in order to defraud more than a dozen people aspiring to obtain US citizenship lost his appeal challenging his 60-month prison sentence.

The US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit said the sentence, which was more than triple the upper bound of the guidelines advisory range, wasn’t substantively unreasonable.

The trial court adopted the guidelines advisory range of 12 to 18 months. But it imposed an upward variance based on the nature of Fidel Morejon Vega’s offense, calling his conduct “shocking,” in part because his criminal conduct began less than ...