Leah B. Foley United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts | Department of Justice
A Brazilian national living in Danbury, Connecticut, was sentenced to nine months in prison for conspiring to obtain driver’s licenses for individuals not eligible to receive them, mainly illegal aliens. Helbert Costa Generoso, 41, received his sentence from U.S. District Court Judge Margaret R. Guzman on October 2, 2025. Upon completion of his sentence, he will be subject to deportation.
Costa Generoso pleaded guilty in June 2025 to one count of conspiracy to unlawfully produce and possess with intent to transfer identification documents and one count of furnishing a false passport for use by another person. He was charged in December 2024 along with four co-conspirators.
Between November 2020 and September 2024, Costa Generoso and others fraudulently obtained driver’s licenses for illegal aliens who lived in states where such individuals were not allowed to get these documents. Before July 2023, Massachusetts did not permit illegal aliens to obtain driver's licenses; however, since 2019 New York allowed it.
The group conspired to get New York driver’s licenses for customers outside the state—including residents of Massachusetts—and after July 2023 did the same with Massachusetts licenses for out-of-state customers. They typically charged $1,400 per license application and also charged $1,400 for fraudulent foreign passports used as identification during the process.
To bypass requirements set by the New York Department of Motor Vehicles (NY DMV), which included passing a written test and completing driving coursework from a New York school—with online tests requiring real-time webcam photos—the conspirators gathered several staged photographs from their clients that made it appear they were taking the tests themselves. The group then completed online permit tests on behalf of their clients and uploaded these pre-taken images when prompted by NY DMV systems.
Additionally, Costa Generoso and his co-defendants created fake certificates of course completion from New York driving schools and forged staff signatures on those documents. When applying at NY DMV locations—which required proof of identity and residence—the conspirators met groups of customers in Massachusetts and drove them together to branches in New York. There they provided fraudulent documents showing supposed residency within the state so that NY DMV would issue permits based on this false information.
After obtaining permits sent to addresses controlled by the defendants in New York, they delivered them directly to their clients. The defendants then scheduled road tests with NY DMV; if passed, full driver’s licenses were mailed again to addresses managed by the group before being handed over in person.
The same approach was allegedly used later for obtaining Massachusetts driver’s licenses for people residing out-of-state. In total, more than 1,000 applications were filed through this scheme; over 600 licenses were issued fraudulently while hundreds of thousands of dollars were collected as payment.
Costa Generoso is the second defendant convicted in this case—Cesar Agusto Martin Reis was previously sentenced in September 2025 to time served (290 days) for his involvement.
“United States Attorney Leah B. Foley; Michael J. Krol, Special Agent in Charge of Homeland Security Investigations in New England; and Kelly Larco-Ward, Inspector in Charge of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, Boston Division made the announcement.”
“Valuable assistance was provided by the NY DMV Division of Field Investigation; the Boston, Danbury (Conn.) and Waterbury (Conn.) Police Departments; the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Connecticut; and the New York State Inspector General’s Office.”
“Assistant U.S. Attorney Brendan O’Shea of the Worcester Branch Office is prosecuting the case.”
“The details contained in the charging documents are allegations. The remaining defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.”
