LOS ANGELES (AP) - Yuliya Kalinina spelled out exactly what she was looking for in a husband in her Internet ad: "Green Card Marriage -- Will pay $300/month. Total $15,000," the Russian national wrote in an ad placed on the Craigslist website. "This is strictly platonic business offer, sex not involved."
The ad caught the attention of the man who would eventually marry her on Feb. 17, 2006. But it also alerted agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Kalinina and her 30-year-old husband, Benjamin C. Adams, were arrested last week for what federal prosecutors allege was a sham marriage.
Robert Schoch, special agent in charge of ICE investigations in L.A., says it is the first criminal case he is aware of in which people allegedly used the Internet to engineer a sham marriage for a green card, and the case is promising to generate repercussions in other couples as well.
"Every pop tart who gets a load on and says 'I-do' might very well be investigated by the government as having committed Marriage-Shammery in the First Degree, and that's a felony," said Ari Emanuel of the Endeavor press agency, one of Hollywood's largest, "and think of all those Vegas weddings where people get hitched then divorced as soon as the drugs wear off. And can you even begin to imagine what this means for Washington couples like the Clinton's if the federal government is going to start charging people for living a lie for financial gain?"
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