CANADA ONE BUSINESSMAN ORIGINALLY FROM SENEGAL WHO HELPED MORE THAN 315 BOGUS MARRIAGES AND FACING FIVE YEARS PRISON AND POSSIBLE FINE OF UP TO $ 100,000 BUT JUDGE REFUSED TO SEND HIM TO JAIL AS 40 PEOPLE WERE ARRESTED AS PART OF THE SCHEME BUT BUSINESSMAN CLAIMED HE HELPED NORTH AMERICAN IMMIGRANT TO SPEED UP THEIR RESIDENT STATUS IN COUNTRY 19TH JANUARY 2014 MONTREAL -- A judge has refused to jail a Montreal-based businessman who set up nearly two dozen fake marriages to help foreigners obtain Canadian citizenship. Instead, Amadou Niang was fined and given a suspended sentence for his part in a fraud ring that produced 315 bogus nuptials. Niang was facing a five-year prison term and a possible fine of up to $100,000. Niang, 57, claimed that he was helping North African immigrants in Canada to speed up their resident status. Niang was accused of arranging 20 fake marriages between 2007 and 2009, and of falsely presenting himself as an immigration consultant, which is an illegal act. Judge Jean-Pierre Boyer said Niangs actions harmed the integrity of the Canadian immigration system. Boyer fined Niang $42,000 and sentenced him to two years less a day, to be served in the community. The judge also permitted Niang to continue to travel to his native Senegal, where he has business. About 40 people were arrested as part of the fraud ring in a police operation labelled Conjugal. Sentences ranged from conditional sentences to unconditional discharges. Also sentenced was Maimouna Barry, a 28-year-old accused of being in a false marriage and of being a witness to two additional false marriages. Barry was given a six-month suspended sentence. The judge said that her case also did not merit jail time.
Posted on: Tue, 21 Jan 2014 02:46:18 +0000
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