An American entrepreneur of Indian origin has admitted to committing visa fraud in federal court. The first week of November, Kishore Dattapuram, 55, of Santa Clara, pleaded guilty in federal court to visa fraud and conspiracy to commit visa fraud.

Dattapuram and two other defendants, Kumar Aswapathi, 55, of Austin, Texas, and Santosh Giri, 48, of San Jose, were each charged in an indictment filed Feb. 28, 2019, with one count of charge of conspiracy to commit visa fraud and 10 counts of substantial visa fraud. Aswapathi pleaded guilty to all counts on October 19, 2020. Giri pleaded guilty to all counts on October 28, 2024.

Background

Dattapuram and Aswapathi owned and operated Nanosemantics, Inc., a staffing company headquartered in San Jose, which provided qualified employees for technology Bay Area companies. As part of its agreements with the companies and employees it places, Nanosemantics receives a commission for the workers placed with its clients.

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Giri worked closely with Nanosemantics and also owned a separate company, LexGiri, a legal process outsourcing company that served as a “remote virtual corporate immigration specialist” for businesses.

As part of its recruiting work, Nanosemantics regularly submitted H-1B petitions for foreign workers.

What is the H-1B visa program

The H-1B visa program allows foreign workers to obtain temporary authorization to live and work for employers in the United States. In order to obtain an H-1B visa, an employer or other sponsor must submit a Form I-129 application to the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).

A petition and associated documentation must confirm the existence and duration of pending employment for the worker, and describe key details, including the salary associated with the position.

H-1B visa fraud

In pleading guilty, Dattapuram admitted to working with Aswapathi and Giri to submit fraudulent H-1B applications that falsely represented that foreign workers had specific rights. jobs were waiting for them in designated end-client companies when in fact the jobs did not exist.

On several occasions, Dattapuram paid companies to be listed as end customers for foreign workers, even though he knew the workers would never work for those employers.

As defendants admitted, the purpose of the scheme was to allow Nanosemantics to obtain visas for applicants before securing them employment, thereby allowing Nanosemantics to place these workers with employers as soon as those jobs became available, rather than waiting for the visa application process. to conclude, and giving Nanosemantics an unfair advantage over its competitors.