Posted on 06/16/2006 1:18:55 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
Audra Schmierer's Social Security number really gets around. At least 81 people in 17 states - most likely illegal immigrants - have used it to get work without her knowledge.
It took the government years to discover her information was being used illegally by so many people. Even then, authorities took little action.
"They knew what was happening but wouldn't do anything," said Schmierer, 33, a housewife in this affluent San Francisco suburb. "One name, one number, why can't they just match it up?"
The case is an egregious example of a common immigration problem: Personal information being misused and federal authorities doing little to catch the culprits.
Under current law, employers do not have to verify Social Security numbers or other documents required for job seekers to be hired.
The situation has long drawn fire from anti-illegal immigration groups. But only recently has Congress moved to fix it. Both the House and Senate have passed immigration reform bills that call for employers to verify Social Security numbers in a national database.
Homeland Security officials have taken it a step further, calling on Congress to allow the Social Security Administration to share information with immigration enforcement agents at work sites.
"Identifying businesses that are habitually flagged for submitting mismatched Social Security numbers would bolster our work site enforcement efforts," Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said earlier this month.
Currently, if the Internal Revenue Service or Social Security Administration find multiple people using the same Social Security number, the agencies send letters to employers informing them of possible errors.
The IRS fines employers $50 for each duplicate number, a punishment that companies often dismiss as just another cost of doing business.
"Sending letters is the limit to what can be done," Social Security spokesman Lowell Kepke said. "We expect that will be able to fix any records that are incorrect."
The information on mismatched names is seldom sent to other law enforcement agencies, IRS spokeswoman Michelle Lamishaw said.
Schmierer realized she had a problem in February 2005, when she got a statement from the IRS saying she owed $15,813 in back taxes - even though she hadn't worked since her son was born in 2000.
Perhaps even more surprising, the taxes were due from jobs in Texas.
Schmierer called the IRS and was told numerous people were using her Social Security number. Officials said the erroneous balances would be eliminated, but the agency would have to correct the problem again in future years.
"They told me they couldn't do anything else," Schmierer said.
IRS officials have declined to talk about Schmierer's case, citing privacy laws.
Schmierer has done a little investigating of her own, combing the tax bills sent to her for names and locations of employers who hired people using her number.
She also obtained 201 W-2s and 1099s from 2001 to 2004, all of which contained her Social Security number but different names. Schmierer provided copies of the records to The Associated Press.
People used her Social Security number from Florida to Washington state, at construction sites, fast-food restaurants and even major high-tech companies. Some opened bank accounts using the number.
Most worked multiple jobs in the same year, though some remained at the same companies for several years. The top wage earned was $39,465 by a man in Texas in 2003 who had $2,820 withheld in federal income taxes. A woman in Ohio earned $18,930 in 2002 and had $718 withheld by the IRS.
Most incomes reported under Schmierer's number were less than $15,000, with most people paying less than $1,000 in federal income tax. The documents do not indicate how many filed tax returns.
Though impossible to verify in every case, information gleaned from criminal investigations, tax documents and other sources suggested that most of the users were probably illegal immigrants.
Schmierer filed a police report after learning one man had used her information in 2003 at janitorial and landscaping companies near Haltom City, Texas.
Investigators found the man, who was not arrested but told police he had bought a fake Social Security card at a flea market, according to a police report.
Schmierer tracked down other people, finding that her number had been used to get work but not to access her credit card or bank accounts.
What started as a hassle turned into a major headache earlier this year when she sought work through a temporary agency that learned her Social Security number had been used by a woman in Texas two years earlier.
The agency, which confirmed the story but asked not to be named, couldn't hire Schmierer for more than a month while the situation was clarified.
"How do you prove that you are you?" Schmierer said. "It's like you are guilty until proven innocent."
While returning from a trip to Mexico with her husband last year, Schmierer was detained for four hours in a Dallas airport by immigration officials. The reason: a woman using her Social Security number was wanted for a felony.
Schmierer never determined how her number became so widely used. Sellers of fake documents often make up numbers and print them on many documents.
Schmierer's number became so compromised that Social Security officials finally decided this week to give her a new one - a rare step taken only in extreme cases, Kepke said.
Schmierer hopes the change will help her close the frustrating chapter but believes her old number will continue to be misused.
"It's clear to me that because my number has been used for so long, it's not going to stop," she said.
She should be getting some awesome Social Security checks based on all her reported income.
Let me get this straight--since "undocumented migrants"
are eligible to collect SS benefits, does this mean this woman can collect all the benefits that have come about because
they have been abusing *her* SSN??
Dang IRS will probable make HER pay taxes on the income instead of punished the real lawbreakers!!! >:-(
punished=punishing
ping
My daughter's SS number was stolen by illegals. She lives in CA and the illegal was working in Utah. The IRS tried to make her pay taxes on the money earned in Utah, finally relenting after it was pointed out 30 or 40 times that she couldn't possibly have worked both jobs at the same time. The feds don't care as long as they get their money. We need to change the house and senate, big time. We need to also dump the IRS.
Ya think?
"Comprehensive Immigration Package"...
that's Washingtonese for Amnesty for Identity Theft committed by Illegals.
bookmarking
I just saw something the other day about a woman who has gone public re: just how easy it is to obtain personal records/info of citizens thru info ONLINE from banks/morgage companies etc.
She had even obtained Jeb Bush's SS# (private info), interestingly, after she made this news public, Jeb's SS# ended up blocked out from this site while other Floridians SS#'s (private info) REMAINED for all to see.
Locally we had a (retired) woman get her benefits cut, due to her job in NJ @ a pizza joint.....seems like the IRS was also demanding back taxes.
Well no, because the Senate wants to give that money to the illegals who stole her identity.
Shouldn't the employers face some civil liability?
Maybe these *good* Senators should *lend* out their own SS#'s.
Just incredible! Lou Dobbs had this story on a few weeks ago. Here's the transcript if anyone is interested (about half way down the page):
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0606/08/ldt.01.html
Watch out!
Our Open Borders and Amnesty Loving Republican In Name Only Chris Cannon will have your daughter arrested for violating the civil rights of one of President Bush's Good Hearted People.
Bingo! Thats why the government does nothing. All the illegals using fake numbers is free money for SSN. They will never claim it.
LOL . . . just a tad off the mark and map aye? Boy affluence has sure gone down in price and amenities I guess. Some people just see Cal. as one big city I swear.
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