Alien smuggler Anna Czerwien sentenced

By ANDREW GANT andrewg@nwfdailynews.com

WASHINGTON — A man who smuggled illegal aliens into Northwest Florida will spend more time in prison than his co-conspirators, the U.S. Attorney’s Office announced Tuesday.

A judge sentenced Justin Eric King, 27, of Chipley, to 41 months in federal prison after a jury in December convicted him on multiple counts of fraud and conspiracy to commit alien smuggling.  King will also spend three years under supervision after he is released from prison.

He lived in Walton County and was an officer and employee of two firms that helped bring illegal aliens to work in the hotel industry in and near Destin.  Most of the aliens were Bulgarians and Romanians, investigators say.

The firms — Eurohouse Holding Corp. and Woland Inc. — helped more than 200 aliens receive illegal work visas from 1999 to 2007. King signed on in 2005, negotiating new contracts with hotel owners and communicating with state and federal agencies “and broadening the conspiracy,” prosecutors said. He mailed 1,558 fraudulent H2-B visa applications to alien candidates. More than 70 of them entered the country on King’s visas and he harbored another 39.

A temporary H2-B visa allows an alien employee to work for a specific employer if there are no U.S. workers available. In mailing out the applications, prosecutors said King helped haul in “substantially more alien workers” than employers needed.

Three of King’s coconspirators pleaded guilty and testified against him in the December jury trial. They are:

38-year-old Aleksander V. Berman, who was sentenced to 23 months in prison.
57-year-old Anna Czerwien, who was sentenced to 18 months.
45-year-old Vyacheslave Adol’fovich “Stan” Finkel, who was sentenced to 12 months.

All four players also have agreed to a joint forfeiture of $1 million. The government initially sought $3.2 million.

King was charged with one count each of conspiracy to commit visa fraud and conspiracy to commit alien smuggling, and five counts of visa fraud.  The visa fraud conspiracy charge carried a maximum penalty of five years in prison. The other charges carried maximum penalties of 10 years.