MIAMI, Fla. (CBS12) — A Miami man originally from South Africa pleaded guilty to aggravated identity theft after stealing a dead toddler’s identity to gain citizenship 40 years ago.
In addition to the identity theft, he was also convicted on October 15 for making a false statement on a passport application.
According to evidence presented during the trial, 68-year-old Vasudevan Pillay first came to the United States in 1985 with a six-month tourist visa.
When Pillay arrived, prosecutors say Pillay stole the identity of a U.S. citizen who had died decades earlier as a toddler.
Somehow, Pillay obtained the victim’s birth certificate and used his social security number to get a Florida driver’s license in the victim’s name.
U.S. Attorney Jason A. Reding Quiñones for the Southern District of Florida commented on Pillay’s decades-long ruse:
For nearly forty years, this defendant lived under a lie. He stole the identity of a deceased child, defrauded the government, and tried to pass himself off as an American citizen. This conviction restores accountability and reaffirms that the rule of law still matters.
Pillay faces a maximum of 10 years in prison for the false statement on a passport application and a mandatory two-year prison term for aggravated identity theft, which must run consecutively to any other sentence imposed, per court documents.