[quote=deadzone]Excellent summary of the situation BG. Only point that I would contend is you implied the border crossers working in San Diego have work visa. That is not typically the case in my experience. I know many who have border crossing card (i.e. tourist Visa) but are working illegally. Absent a green card, what work permit or work visa do you think they have that would legally allow them to work in hotel/restaurant industry?[/quote] deadzone, my understanding is the vast majority of Mexican Nationals applying for jobs in SD County have at least a work permit which is reapplied for by their employer annually. Whatever identification they show (CA Driver License, which is easy to get for a Mexican National), MX birth certificate and work permit/visa is enough to satisfy the I-9 requirements and hire them. It is up to the employer if they want to renew their work permits/visa each year to retain their services.
More troubling is the lack of ability of the employer to tell at first blush if a border-crosser’s SSN number they are positing as their own was legitimately issued to them or was that of a deceased US citizen. As I recall, physical specimens of SS cards purchased in LA on the black market in the past 20 years were a pretty good facsimile of the real thing. My college-student kid, based in LA County just asked me to send them their “original” SS card ASAP last month, which I did (after taking a color copy of it). They had just gotten a new job and was slated for orientation in a few days where the employer needed to see their “original” SS card to complete their I-9. I thought that was odd as my kid didn’t have to produce it for the job they had last year and I have never been asked to produce mine to an employer, just my SS number. But employers are getting wise to the fake SS cards and now have guides and procedures in place to determine the legitimacy of SS cards which every applicant who is hired presents to them.
I have noticed that in the past (2+?) years the online US SS Death Index is now either by subscription only and/or closed to the public, so an employer who does not subscribe to it cannot immediately find out if the SSNs being presented to them by new hires were previously used by a now deceased person unless they (or their parent company) subscribe to it.
Sites of SS prefixes issued by state and year are out there. Example:
Another problem is a typical HR assistant taking the I-9 info from a new hire has little experience and therefore would very likely not recognize fraud if a 24 year-old applicant was attempting to use a CA issued SSN beginning with 555 (likely issued between 1955 and 1957), for example. Before 1986, US-born minors did not typically apply for a SS number until they were at least 15 years of age and seeking a work permit (so may or may not have been born in the state in which they received their assigned SSN).
In this case, our (fictitious) original SSN holder died at the age of 58 of cancer in 1999 in San Joaquin County and their SS number was subsequently sold on the black market off the street in LA in 2008 and ended up in the hands of this 24-year-old job applicant in San Diego County.
Now that the SS Death Index is no longer public, no new numbers of decedents can be easily be used to manufacture fraudulent SS cards (but older lists are probably still floating around underground).
This very important “I-9 completion business” for new hires really needs to be performed by the most senior HR representative of the organization. It is NOT a job for the HR “newbie.”
maybe brian/FIH can shed a little more light on this thorny subject for the Piggs. IIRC, he’s fairly knowledgeable in this area.
