Two Honduran nationals residing unlawfully in the United States have been charged in Georgia for allegedly smuggling a 15-year-old girl into the country using a stolen identity and subsequently filing a fraudulent sponsorship application to gain custody of her, according to federal prosecutors.
The indictment, which was unsealed in the Northern District of Georgia, accuses Luis Adolfo Mendoza Fonseca, 30, from Raleigh, North Carolina, and Rosmery Yamibel Castillo Fonseca, 25, from Lawrenceville, Georgia, of conspiracy and fraud offenses connected to the alleged operation.
As reported by the U.S. Department of Justice, Mendoza Fonseca met the girl, a Nicaraguan national, online in the spring of 2024 and initiated what prosecutors have characterized as a romantic relationship. Authorities claim he encouraged and financed the minor’s departure from her home in Nicaragua, facilitating her journey to the United States under the identity of another minor, supposedly from Honduras.
Prosecutors allege that Castillo Fonseca instructed the girl to inform immigration officials that she was her cousin. After the teenager crossed the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas, Castillo Fonseca reportedly submitted a sponsorship application to the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement, falsely asserting that the girl was her Honduran cousin to secure custody.
Both defendants later confessed to staff at a federally funded care facility that the child was not the individual named in the sponsorship application and that Mendoza Fonseca had formed a romantic online relationship with her, as stated in court documents.
The duo faces charges of one count of conspiracy to encourage and induce an alien to enter and reside in the United States, one count of aiding and abetting the encouragement and inducement of an alien for commercial advantage or private financial gain, and one count of aiding and abetting the submission of a false statement. If found guilty, they could face up to 10 years in prison for each of the smuggling-related charges and up to five years for the false statement charge.
An indictment is merely an accusation, and the defendants are considered innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
