Bill Melugin calls this a “wild one.” Melugin posts this February 18 press release to tell the story of a Minnesota correctional officer and AWOL National Guard member masquerading as a an American citizen despite having no legal status in the United States. The serial fraudster was identified as part of the major enforcement operation that targeted suspected immigration fraud — where else? — in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area last fall:
Morris Brown, a 45-year-old illegal alien from Liberia, was arrested Jan. 15 in Minneapolis by ICE for multiple violations of U.S. immigration law, including overstaying his student visa and making false claims to U.S. citizenship….
Brown last entered the U.S. in 2014 on a non-immigrant student visa that was terminated in 2015 because he failed to enroll in a full course of study. Despite not having legal status, he joined the Pennsylvania Army National Guard in 2014 but went AWOL the next year. He was ultimately apprehended and discharged from the military under other than honorable conditions in 2022.
Brown applied for a Green Card in 2020 under the Liberian Refugee Immigration Fairness program. USCIS denied his application due to misrepresentations, including his failure to disclose prior military service and his false claim to U.S. citizenship. In 2024, in another commission of fraud, he applied to naturalize as a U.S. citizen based on prior military service.
During Operation Twin Shield, USCIS investigators looking into Brown’s application for citizenship found evidence of marriage fraud and prior instances where he falsely claimed to be a U.S. citizen in official documents. They also learned he was working as a corrections officer for the state of Minnesota—despite having no legal immigration status—by claiming to be a U.S. citizen. USCIS referred his case to ICE, and Brown now faces removal proceedings and potential criminal prosecution for immigration fraud, false claims to U.S. citizenship, and related offenses.
Not just your average good neighbor. As Melugin says, this is a wild one, and right in our back yard. The Star Tribune describes him as “of Circle Pines” in lieu of its traditional formulation that would render him a “Circle Pines man.” Nevertheless, that’s how I will think of him. He will always be a Circle Pines man to me.
The Circle Pines man worked for the Minnesota Department of Corrections until this past October. As wild as Brown’s story is, this is even wilder. Department of Corrections Commissioner Paul Schnell thanks the immigration authorities for their efforts. “If these federal allegations are accurate, this individual engaged in sophisticated efforts to misrepresent their identity, extending well beyond Minnesota,” Schnell said. “We are grateful to USCIS and ICE for their work in investigating and addressing immigration fraud.” Now that is wild.
