Fremont Business Owner Sentenced To Over Four Years In Prison For Role In Visa Fraud Conspiracy, Mail Fraud, Witness Tampering, And Related Crimes

SAN JOSE – Sunitha Guntipally was sentenced today to 52 months in prison for her role in a conspiracy to commit several crimes including visa fraud, obstruction of justice, use of false documents, mail fraud, and witness tampering, announced United States Attorney Brian J. Stretch; U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Special Agent in Charge Ryan Spradlin; and U.S. State Department, Diplomatic Security Service, San Francisco Field Office Special Agent in Charge Matthew Perlman.  The sentence was handed down by the Honorable Lucy H. Koh, U.S. District Judge, after Guntipally pleaded guilty to the conspiracy charge on May 3, 2017. 

A federal grand jury indicted Sunitha Guntipally, 44, of Fremont, and three co-defendants, Venkat Guntipally, 49, of Fremont; Pratap “Bob” Kondamoori, 56, of Incline Village, Nev.; and Sandhya Ramireddi, 58, of Pleasanton, in a 33-count indictment filed May 5, 2016.  The indictment contains charges in connection with the submission of fraudulent applications for H-1B specialty-occupation work visas.

In connection with her guilty plea, Sunitha Guntipally admitted that she and Venkat Guntipally were a husband and wife team who founded and owned DS Soft Tech and Equinett, two employment-staffing companies for technology firms. Sunitha Guntipally admitted that between approximately 2010 and 2014, she and her co-defendants submitted more than one hundred additional fraudulent petitions for foreign workers to be placed at other purported companies.  The end-client companies listed in the fraudulent H-1B applications either did not exist or never received the proposed H-1B workers.  None of them ever intended to receive those H-1B workers.  These applications were designed and intended to create a pool of H-1B beneficiaries who then could be placed at legitimate employment positions in the Northern District of California and elsewhere.  Through this scheme, Sunitha Guntipally, along with her co-conspirators, gained an unfair advantage over competing employment-staffing firms and, as a result, she and her husband, Venkat Guntipally, earned money from these downstream companies for themselves and their companies.  In addition, Sunitha Guntipally admitted that she obstructed justice, and directed her co-defendant to do the same, in an effort to mislead the agents, and conceal the conspiracy.

In sum, Sunitha Guntipally was charged with one count of conspiracy, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 371; ten counts of substantive visa fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1546(a); seven counts of using false statements, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1001(a)(3); four counts of mail fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1341; and four counts of witness tampering, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1512(b)(3).  Pursuant to her guilty plea, Sunitha Guntipally pleaded guilty to the conspiracy charge and the remaining charges were dismissed.  

In sentencing Sunitha Guntipally, Judge Koh stated that the defendant’s crime does “damage to the rule of law.”  Judge Koh stated that the defendant’s conduct “undermines respect for our legal immigration system” and does “tremendous damage to our institutions and affects the rights of others to immigrate to the United States.”   

In addition to the prison term, Judge Koh ordered Sunitha Guntipally to serve three years of supervised release and to pay a $50,000 fine.  Each of Sunitha Guntipally’s co-defendants has already pleaded guilty to his respective roles in the scheme.  Judge Koh sentenced Ramireddi to 14 months’ imprisonment and Kondamoori to 20 months’ imprisonment for their respective roles earlier this year.  Venkat Guntipally, Sunitha Guntipally’s husband, is scheduled to be sentenced on March 21, 2018, at 9:15 a.m.  

Assistant U.S. Attorney Timothy J. Lucey is prosecuting the case with the assistance of Laurie Worthen.  The prosecution is the result of an investigation led by the U.S. Department of State Diplomatic Security Service’s representative to the Document and Benefit Fraud Task Force (DBFTF) overseen by the Department of Homeland Security’s Homeland Security Investigations. The DBFTF is a multi-agency task force that coordinates investigations into fraudulent immigration documents. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service’s Office of Fraud Detection and National Security also assisted with the investigation.