A man who used another person’s Social Security number to get a job was sentenced today to more than six months in federal prison.
Ernesto Gonzalez-Casas, age 46, a citizen of Mexico illegally present in the United States and residing in Williamsburg, Iowa, received the prison term after an Oct. 2, 2019, guilty plea to two counts of misuse of a social security number.
At the guilty plea, Gonzalez-Casas admitted that on July 12, 2017, and September 5, 2017, he used someone else’s name and social security number on state and federal tax forms when completing employment forms in Williamsburg, Iowa.
On December 7, 2018, Gonzalez-Casas came to the attention of law enforcement when he tried to transfer title to a vehicle under an alias name at the Iowa County Treasurer’s Office. The alias name was in the Iowa Department of Transportation records system as possibly being a stolen identity as reported by the true victim. Gonzalez-Casas told law enforcement officers that he was a United States citizen born in Texas and falsely claimed he had previously filed a report in Iowa County of the identity theft of his alias name. Gonzalez-Casas’ fingerprints showed he was not the person he claimed to be. Instead, immigration records showed he was a Mexican citizen illegally present in the United States and not a United States citizen as he claimed. On June 17, 2019, Gonzalez-Casas was convicted in the Iowa District Court for Iowa County of making a false report to law enforcement and sentenced to 180 days’ imprisonment.
Gonzalez-Casas was sentenced in Cedar Rapids by United States District Court Judge C.J. Williams. Gonzalez-Casas was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment. He must also serve a three-year term of supervised release after the prison term. There is no parole in the federal system.
Gonzalez-Casas is being held in the United States Marshal’s custody until he can be transported to a federal prison.
The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Daniel C. Tvedt and investigated by Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Enforcement and Removal Operations; the Iowa Department of Transportation, and the Iowa County Sheriff’s Department.
Court file information at https://ecf.iand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl.
The case file number is 19-CR-67.
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Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
