A San Ysidro man was sentenced Thursday to more than five years in prison for impersonating an ICE agent to defraud more than two dozen people, many of them undocumented immigrants seeking green cards and U.S. citizenship.
Davyd George Brand Jimenez, 55, pleaded guilty in April to 10 counts of false impersonation of a federal officer and employee, two counts of mail fraud, two counts of wire fraud, one count of possession of fraudulent seals of departments and agencies of the United States, and one count of aggravated identity theft.
In his plea agreement, he admitted to tricking and defrauding at least 25 people into paying him at least $152,476.
U.S. District Judge Fernando M. Olguin adopted the recommendations from prosecutors and the defense and ordered that Brand serve 41 months concurrently with a sentence he is currently serving for a conviction in a drug case out of the Southern District of California, followed by an additional two year prison term.
During the hearing, Brand, hands clasped behind his jail jumpsuit, said he owed the biggest apology “to the people who lost out.”
“I apologize to them,” he said.
Brand admitted in his plea agreement that from April 2019 through at least April 2023, in Orange County, he falsely claimed to be an ICE agent and told his victims that he could help them obtain work permits, legal United States residency, and U.S. citizenship. He admitted to charging as much as $20,000 per “customer.”
“Defendant’s offense conduct in posing as a federal officer and soliciting payments from victims is serious and undermined the federal government by suggesting that federal officers could be bribed for services,” Asst. U.S. Atty. Kevin Y. Fu wrote in his sentencing memo.
Brand would meet his victims in public places — including at a park in Santa Ana — and would display a fake ICE badge or a firearm to potential and existing “customer victims,” according to the plea agreement. At times, he admitted in the plea, he falsely claimed to have previously worked for the DEA, claimed to be an attorney or claimed to be doing work with or at U.S. consulates.
After receiving payments from victims, Brand never filed immigration applications on their behalf, according to the plea agreement. He admitted to fabricating immigration documents to give to victims, fraudulently affixing a watermark bearing the Department of Homeland Security seal.
In one case, Brand admitted to fabricating a stay of deportation for a victim, in which he fraudulently checked off “GRANTED” on the application and put a name for the purported ICE official who approved the stay. He sent a photograph of the fabricated stay of deportation to the victim in 2020.
Brand also admitted to providing a victim with valid U.S. documents, including a Social Security card and passport card, but in a different name, so they could unlawfully pose in that identity and live and work in the U.S.
In a sentencing memo, Brand’s federal public defender called him an “ambitious and motivated father, husband, and son,” but said his childhood “was filled with addiction and extreme sexual and physical abuse and neglect, which drove him to use cocaine heavily throughout his life.”
“His untreated addiction and emotional trauma are his biggest obstacles and played a significant role in landing him here,” Hannah A. Bogen wrote in the memo. “Mr. Brand makes no excuses for his actions, and knows that he harmed many as a result of his choices.”
In a letter to the judge, Brand said he accepted full responsibility and was “very remorseful.”
“I spent a lifetime running from psychological hurt and damage, only to become a cause of it myself,” Brand said. “It has taken me a while to write that last sentence, knowing the insurmountable pain and loss I have caused.”
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