October 23, 2012
Kansas case puts US face
on 'total identity theft'
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — When Candida L. Gutierrez's identity was
stolen, the thief didn't limit herself to opening fraudulent credit
and bank accounts. She assumed Gutierrez's persona completely, using
it to get a job, a driver's license, a mortgage and even medical care
for the birth of two children.
All the while, the crook claimed the real Gutierrez was the one
who had stolen her identity. The women's unusual tug-of-war puts a
face on "total identity theft," a brazen form of the crime
in which con artists go beyond financial fraud to assume many other
aspects of another person's life.
The scheme has been linked to illegal immigrants who use stolen
Social Security numbers to get paid at their jobs, and authorities
fear the problem could soon grow to ensnare more unsuspecting
Americans.
"When she claimed my identity and I claimed it back, she was
informed that I was claiming it too," said Gutierrez, a
31-year-old elementary schoolteacher. "She knew I was aware and
that I was trying to fight, and yet she would keep fighting. It is
not like she realized and she stopped. No, she kept going, and she
kept going harder."
A 32-year-old illegal immigrant named Benita Cardona-Gonzalez is
accused of using Gutierrez's identity during a 10-year period when
she worked at a Topeka company that packages refrigerated foods. For
years, large numbers of illegal immigrants have filled out payroll
forms using their real names but stolen Social Security numbers.
However, as electronic employment verification systems such as
E-Verify become more common, the use of fake numbers is increasingly
difficult. Now prosecutors worry that more people will try to fool
the systems by assuming full identities rather than stealing the
numbers alone.
For victims, total identity theft can also have serious health
consequences if electronic medical records linked to Social Security
numbers get mixed up, putting at risk the accuracy of important
patient information such as blood types or life-threatening
allergies.
Federal Trade Commission statistics show that Americans reported
more than 279,000 instances of identity theft in 2011, up from
251,100 a year earlier. While it is unclear how many of those cases
involve total identity theft, one possible indicator is the number of
identity theft complaints that involve more than one type of identity
theft — 13 percent last year, compared with 12 percent a year
earlier.
Nationwide, employment-related fraud accounted for 8 percent of
identity theft complaints last year. But in states with large
immigrant populations, employment-related identity fraud was much
higher: 25 percent in Arizona, 15 percent in Texas, 16 percent in New
Mexico, 12 percent in California.
Prosecutors say that the longer a person uses someone else's
identity, the more confident the thief becomes using that identity
for purposes other than just working. Once they have become
established in a community, identity thieves don't want to live in
the shadows and seek a normal life like everybody else. That's when
they take the next step and get a driver's license, a home loan and
health insurance.
"And so that is a natural progression, and that is what we
are seeing," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Brent Anderson, who is
prosecuting the case against Gutierrez's imposter. Gutierrez first
learned her identity had been hijacked when she was turned down for a
mortgage more than a decade ago. Now each year she trudges to the
Social Security Administration with her birth certificate, driver's
license, passport and even school yearbooks to prove her identity and
clear her employment record.
She spends hours on the phone with creditors and credit bureaus,
fills out affidavits and has yet to clean up her credit history. Her
tax records are a mess. She even once phoned the imposter's Kansas
employer in a futile effort to find some relief.
Both women claimed they were identity theft victims and sought to
get new Social Security numbers. The Social Security Administration
turned down the request from Gutierrez, instead issuing a new number
to the woman impersonating her. And in another ironic twist,
Gutierrez was forced to file her federal income tax forms using a
special identification number usually reserved for illegal
immigrants.
"It is such a horrible nightmare," Gutierrez said. "You
get really angry, and then you start realizing anger is not going to
help. ... But when you have so much on your plate and you keep such a
busy life, it is really such a super big inconvenience. You have to
find the time for someone who is abusing you."
When Gutierrez recently got married, her husband began researching
identity theft on the Internet and stumbled across identity theft
cases filed against other illegal immigrants working at Reser's Fine
Foods, the same manufacturer where Cardona-Gonzalez worked. He
contacted federal authorities in Kansas and asked them to investigate
the employee working there who had stolen his wife's identity.
The alleged imposter was arrested in August, and her fingerprints
confirmed that immigration agents had encountered Cardona-Gonzalez in
1996 in Harlingen, Texas, and sent her back to Mexico.
Cardona-Gonzalez did not respond to a letter sent to her at the
Butler County jail, where she is awaiting trial on charges of
aggravated identity theft, misuse of a Social Security number and
production of a false document.
Her attorney, Matthew Works, did not respond to phone calls and
emails seeking comment. Court filings indicate the two sides are
negotiating a plea agreement. Citing privacy issues, the Social
Security Administration declined to discuss the Gutierrez case.
Reser's Fine Foods did not return a message left at its Topeka plant.
Anderson
expects more cases of total identity theft "because we all know
what is going on out there — which is thousands and thousands of
people who are working illegally in the United States under false
identities, mostly of U.S. citizens, and very little is being done
about it. But we are doing something about it, one case at a time."
