RIVERSIDE, Calif. — Three people with close family ties to the couple responsible for the San Bernardino terror attack were arrested Thursday in an alleged marriage-fraud scheme involving a pair of Russian sisters.
The accused include Syed Raheel Farook. His brother and sister-in-law, Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik, died in a shootout with police after killing 14 people and wounding 22 others on Dec. 2.
Also arrested were Syed Raheel Farook’s wife, Tatiana, and her sister, Mariya Chernykh. Prosecutors say Mariya’s marriage to Enrique Marquez Jr., the only person charged in the shootings, was a sham designed to enable her to obtain legal status in the U.S. after overstaying a visitor visa in 2009.
Marquez confessed to the scheme when authorities questioned him about the shootings, and he acknowledged getting $200 a month to marry Chernykh, according to his criminal complaint.
At a court hearing Thursday, the mother of the Farook brothers agreed to post $25,000 bond for her oldest son and his wife. Rafia Farook was expected to post bond for the pair Thursday, securing their release.
“This is about a misrepresentation, an act of marriage,” Raheel Farook’s attorney, Ronald Cordova, told a federal court judge in arguing for his client to be allowed to post bond.
“This is not about terrorism,” he said.
Chernykh’s hearing was delayed as her attorney tried to get her boyfriend to come to court to post bond for her. Her attorney was arguing that his client wasn’t a flight risk.
If convicted of conspiracy to make false statements on federal immigration documents, the Farooks and Chernykh face up to five years in prison. Chernykh also is charged with fraud, misuse of visas and other documents, perjury and two counts of making false statements, which could mean up to 25 years in prison.
The government may have brought the charges as a bargaining chip in order to get more information that the Farooks and Chernykh haven’t shared, said James Wedick, a former FBI agent who was with the agency for 35 years.
“It suggests to me they weren’t talking so the government decided to ask a grand jury to return charges,” Wedick said. “If they were cooperating, they’d probably make some kind of deal.”
While the government can benefit from continued interviews with the trio, Wedick said they also stand to benefit.
“It’s a mechanism for both the government and the defense lawyers to use to better their position — with the government trying to get information relative to terrorism, and the defense looking to resolve the matter without prison time,” he said.
According to an indictment unsealed Thursday, Syed Raheel and Tatiana Farook participated in the sham by acting as witnesses to the union of her sister and Marquez, and by creating a joint checking account along with a backdated lease to make it appear as if all four of them lived together.
Tatiana Farook also accompanied her sister to buy a $50 wedding ring, and Marquez and Chernykh posed in photographs that were staged to make the marriage appear real, prosecutors said.
