A federal judge in Louisiana has sentenced the ringleader of a long-running visa fraud scheme to 10 years in federal prison. On November 9, 2026, United States District Judge Jerry Edwards Jr. sentenced Chandrakant “Lala” Patel, 40, of Oakdale, to 120 months in federal prison for conspiracy to commit visa fraud and engaging in monetary transactions in property derived from unlawful activity, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Louisiana announced. Patel had pleaded guilty to the charges on May 28, 2026. Upon completion of his sentence, Patel will be removed from the United States.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice
Four other defendants were also sentenced to five years each for their roles in the conspiracy, the Justice Department said. They are Tebo Onishea, 39, of Glenmora; Chad Doyle, 56, of Oakdale; Michael Slaney, 65, of Oakdale; and Glynn Dixon, 63, of Forest Hill, all of whom held leadership positions in local law enforcement while the scheme ran. Each will serve two years of supervised release after prison, and Doyle, Slaney and Dixon were each ordered to pay a $30,000 fine.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice
How the scheme worked
According to court documents, the scheme ran from about November 2020 to July 2025. Patel, then a local businessman, recruited foreign nationals who were seeking legal status in the United States and accepted payments to have them falsely identified as victims in fictitious armed robbery reports. Patel then paid Onishea, Doyle, Slaney and Dixon — all public servants acting in leadership roles in their communities — to prepare false police reports and certify immigration documents used to support fraudulent U-visa applications.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice
A U-visa is an immigration benefit available to certain noncitizens who are victims of qualifying crimes and who assist law enforcement in investigating or prosecuting those crimes. Prosecutors said the four law-enforcement leaders used their positions to certify the false reports: at the time of the conspiracy, Onishea was the Chief of Police for the City of Glenmora, Doyle was the Chief of Police for the City of Oakdale, Slaney was the Marshal of the Ward 5 Marshal's Office in Oakdale, and Dixon was the Chief of Police for the City of Forest Hill. Court records also show the conspirators transmitted fraudulent documents through the U.S. mail and other interstate carriers to advance the scheme.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice
Each co-defendant's sentence
Onishea was sentenced on September 2, 2026, to 60 months in federal prison for conspiracy to commit visa fraud, followed by two years of supervised release; he had pleaded guilty on May 28, 2026. Doyle was sentenced on September 15, 2026, to 60 months and a $30,000 fine, after pleading guilty on May 20, 2026. Slaney was sentenced on September 16, 2026, to 60 months and a $30,000 fine, after pleading guilty on May 12, 2026. Dixon, the last to plead guilty, on June 30, 2026, was sentenced on November 9, 2026 — the same day as Patel — to 60 months and a $30,000 fine, each followed by two years of supervised release.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice
Why the case matters beyond Louisiana
The case is a direct warning for immigrant communities, including the Punjabi and wider South Asian diaspora across the United States, about the market in fraudulent immigration paperwork. The U-visa exists to protect genuine crime victims who cooperate with police; prosecutors say this scheme instead sold false victim status, backed by real police chiefs' signatures, to people seeking legal status. Cases built on fabricated reports can collapse the applications they were meant to support and deepen official scrutiny of every genuine filing. The Justice Department's account of the scheme — who was paid, what was certified and how the documents moved — comes from court documents and the defendants' own guilty pleas, not from allegations still awaiting trial.
Source: KEDM News, Nov. 11, 2026
The investigation and prosecution
U.S. Attorney Zachary A. Keller for the Western District of Louisiana made the announcement. The case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Internal Revenue Service–Criminal Investigation, and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services' Fraud Detection and National Security Division, as part of the Homeland Security Task Force under Operation Take Back America. It was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys John W. Nickel and Danny Siefker, with assistance from paralegal specialists Joanne Henry-Mills and Denise Duhon. Court documents are filed under Case Number 1:25-cr-00173 in the Western District of Louisiana.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice
Regional coverage in Louisiana carried the same sentencing details. KPLC reported that Patel, described as an Oakdale man who led a visa fraud scheme involving four law enforcement officials, will be removed from the United States after completing his sentence, and KEDM, the public radio news service at the University of Louisiana Monroe, published the full Justice Department announcement on November 11, bringing the case to the state's wider audience two days after the sentencing hearing in Lafayette.
Source: KPLC via Europe Says
What happens next
Patel will serve his 120-month sentence in federal prison and then be removed from the United States, the Justice Department said. The four co-defendants will serve their 60-month terms followed by two years of supervised release, with the $30,000 fines standing against Doyle, Slaney and Dixon. All five defendants pleaded guilty, so there is no trial outstanding in the case; the sentences handed down between September and November 9 close the prosecution that began with the defendants' guilty pleas in May and June 2026. For anyone who paid for help with a U-visa application through unofficial channels, lawyers routinely advise checking the filing against official USCIS records — a caution this case, in which the paperwork itself was the fraud, underlines.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice