A Winnipeg man has been fined $20,000 for his part in a scheme to defraud immigrants hoping to make Canada their home.
Avtar Singh Sohi, 42, was due to stand trial on Monday but instead pleaded guilty to one count of misrepresenting or withholding a material fact from immigration authorities, an offence under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. Eight other charges were deferred by the Crown.
The court heard that the Canada Border Services Agency launched an investigation into immigration consultant Hartar Sohi, Avtar’s brother, and his company, Abroad Immigration, after receiving a tip that Hartar was allegedly involved in a scam to charge foreign nationals for Labour Market Impact Assessments. The assessments are documents issued by the federal government that allow an employer to hire foreign workers in cases where there are no Canadian citizens or permanent residents available for the job.
Investigators executed search warrants at Abroad Immigration’s McPhillips Street office and Avtar’s West St. Paul home in September 2019, where they seized a work permit authorizing a woman to work for Avtar as a nanny.
Investigators seized security video that showed the woman had not entered or left the home in the two weeks before the search warrant was executed, prosecutor Matt Sinclair told the court.
“Investigators then conducted some lifestyle surveillance on (the woman) and observed her at another place of employment during regular working hours and she appeared to be working at that other place of employment without authorisation,” Sinclair told provincial court Justice Catherine Carlson.
At Avtar’s urging, the woman initially lied to investigators, saying she was his nanny, and only revealed the truth when confronted with the security video and evidence of her other job.
“It was at this point that she admitted that her family had paid Hartar Sohi for the LMIA job opportunity, but after the LMIA was paid for, she was told there was no actual job for her,” Sinclair said. “She was also told that if she wanted pay slips to show that she had worked for Avtar Sohi as a nanny, she could use them to support an application for permanent residency, but she would have to pay for (them).”
Pay slips seized from Avtar’s home purported to show that the woman had been his nanny for two years, Sinclair said. Other documents seized supported the woman’s application for permanent residency.
In a separate interview with investigators, a family member said the family had paid Abroad Immigration $40,000 for the assessment document.
“Because of the large amount of money already paid, she had already crossed the Rubicon… the family agreed to pay for the additional pay slips to support her residency,” Sinclair said.
“By creating documents to subvert the immigration system, Avtar was committing fraud,” Sinclair said. “Following the execution of the search warrant, while the Canada Border Services Agency was investigating, he attempted to insulate his behaviour by telling (the woman) to continue lying.
“This behaviour undermines confidence in our immigration system and must be called out and deterred. The scheme itself is predatory in nature to immigrants who have a limited understanding of the immigration system,” Sinclair said.
An accountant interviewed by investigators said Avtar was not an immigration consultant but had “some interactions” with immigration clients, including a B.C. man who sent him $35,000 to have his name placed on an assessment document.
While Avtar was not “the primary perpetrator” of the scheme, his misrepresentations helped keep it going for more than two years, Carlson said.
“It took a lot of resources to get to the bottom of what was going on,” she said. “Misrepresentations like that really make it easier for people to be taken advantage of.”
Hartar remains on trial.
