LOS ANGELES—A senior attorney with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) was sentenced this morning to 212 months in federal prison for taking nearly one-half million dollars in bribes from immigrants who were promised immigration benefits that would allow them to remain in the United States.

ICE Assistant Chief Counsel Constantine Peter Kallas, 40, of Alta Loma, received the 17⅔-year sentence from United States District Judge Terry J. Hatter Jr.
In addition to the prison term, Judge Hatter ordered Kallas to pay $296,865 in restitution after fraudulently receiving worker’s compensation benefits.

“Mr. Kallas has received one of the longest sentences ever seen in a public corruption case,” said United States Attorney André Birotte Jr. “Mr. Kallas took in hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes—money he obtained by exploiting his knowledge of the immigration system. The lengthy sentence reflects the seriousness of the crimes, which were a wholesale violation of the public trust.”

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It is unfortunate any time there is a situation where a public official is engaged in corruption. The case cited above is notable for the fact that the United States government is clearly not treating such cases as anything less than serious. Corruption is a concern for all polities around the world as corruption can undermine the very fabric of the political system in which it occurs. One of the most important aspects of the United States is the high ethical standard by which public servants must adhere. This blogger has personally found that public servants at the Department of Homeland Security, USCIS, and the US Embassy in Bangkok are all helpful and highly ethical, but not all government employees are up to such standards, as evidenced by the quotation above. However, there is a tendency among the public at large to view innocent and upstanding public servants through the same lens as the former attorney noted above. This would be a mistake, most public servants are ethical hard working people who are simply interested in doing the job they were retained to perform. Casting all public servants in the same light as the former ICE agent noted above would fail to take into account the significant contribution of the public servants currently providing valuable services to the American public.

For related information please see: USICE.