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Bowie resident Joshua Shonubi was sentenced this week to 18 months in prison after pleading guilty to charges that include conspiracy to commit visa and marriage fraud.
Prosecutors say that Shonubi, who was a paster at New Life City Church, "used his position of trust" to help further the scam, facilitating more than 60 fraudulent marriages and submitting "well over" 100 fraudulent documents, leading to the federal charges.
"(Shonubi) used his role as a pastor to recruit and groom economically disadvantaged US citizens to marry these foreign nationals and then sponsored them for permanent residence in the United States," court documents state.
To help further his fraud, Shonubi also created false documentation and submitted it to US Citizen and Immigration Services so that the sham marriage would become official and the foreign national could apply for permanent residency, and later, US citizenship.
He would submit letters on church letterhead asserting under oath that he performed and officiated the weddings himself, while also submitting leases and paystubs to support the façade that the union was real.
Shonubi also pleaded guilty to a charge of aggravated identity theft.
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