Fraudulent foreign engineers

[Dleg]

Finally! My own home "state" is taking enforcement action against fraudulent applications to obtain "temporary" engineering licenses from our Board.

This case involves 17 engineers from Korea, who wanted to become licensed in the Northern Mariana Islands under our "temporary" license program, which would seem to offer some loopholes for foreign engineers to avoid some of the requirements. Last fall, our legislature attempted to pass a law that would allow these particular engineers to be granted licenses without ANY requirements - just show a copy of their Korean PE license. Fortunately, that failed. So, the engineers applied, and apparently, submitted falsified documentation as part of their applications, including (I have heard) falsified licenses and transcripts, all printed here in the NMI by other Korean businessmen.

17 Korean engineers appeal denial of applications
By Cherrie Anne E. Villahermosa

Variety News Staff

EIGHT of the 17 engineers from South Korea whose applications for temporary license to practice here in the CNMI were denied by the Board of Professional Licensing last year were on island yesterday morning for a hearing of their appeal.

The other nine were expected to arrive on Saipan last night.

The 17 applied for a temporary license in 2006 but their applications were not submitted to the CNMI government until Oct. 2007.

The board denied the applications in Nov. 2007.

The applicants, through their interpreter Jonathan Joo of the Korean Association, requested the board for more time to prepare their arguments and the opportunity to be represented by a lawyer.

The board headed by Frank Guerrero granted the applicants’ request and set the next hearing for June 9 and 10.

During the hearing yesterday, Assistant Attorneys General Mike Evangelista and Mike Nisperos submitted several documents such as the applicants’ letters of communication in the process of application, the board’s response and denial, and notices of hearings.

Present at the hearing were Guerrero, board vice chairman Roman Demapan, Gregorio Castro, Florence Sablan, Evangelista, Nisperos, Department of Public Safety investigator John Santos, Attorney General’s Investigating Unit investigator Roger Igisomar, and Assistant Attorney General Alan Barak, who is the board’s counsel and the hearing officer yesterday.

Guerrero, in an interview, said the applications were denied because the Korean engineers did not meet the requirements.

He said the applicants are required to take the National Council of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying’s examination.

“Most of the applicants are not fluent in English and the exam is always in English. They have to pay a $100 fee and it’s non-refundable,” the chairman said.

“They have the right to appeal and the right to be heard that’s why we conducted this hearing this morning and because they needed more time we will continue the hearing in June,” he added.

The applicants are licensed electrical engineers in South Korea.

“They all applied for a license but they did not indicate if they will work for a company or a plant that will be set up here,” Guerrero said.

Assistant Attorney General Mike Nisperos, in a separate interview, said the AG’s office is now looking for possible “white collar implications,” adding that some documents submitted by the applicants are fake.

 

[squishles10]

That's awesome. On a somewhat related note, we've been talking about how people have been able to get around the board requirements for experience and take the exam early. The crappy thing is, the board lets them go! I had an ex-coworker who double counted her time as a grad student and a TA (which, by the way, doesn't count as "teaching experience" in CA) and she took the exam after only working for 4 months! (Just to drag her through the mud some more... she also failed one of her last courses in grad school, so she didn't have her MS when she took the exam, thus violating a whole host of regulations).

Just ridiculous how people try and beat the system, and even worse when it succeeds. Good to know someone is doing something about it!