Gurmeet Singh, a taxicab driver from India, has been stripped of his U.S. citizenship after he was convicted of rape. Singh allegedly kidnapped and raped a female passenger at knifepoint in New York in 2011. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison after being convicted of the violent assault in 2014, according to the Justice Department.
The Justice Department also said Singh concealed his criminal past while applying for U.S. citizenship, which he obtained months after the attack.
“American citizenship is not a shield for criminals,” said Attorney General Todd Blanche. “Gurmeet Singh, a convicted rapist from India, is no longer a U.S. citizen. He concealed a rape and kidnapping during the naturalization process, and a federal court has now revoked his citizenship. This Department took this case across the finish line, and we will continue to move expeditiously on denaturalization referrals. Fraudulently obtained citizenship will not protect criminals from justice.”
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“Singh unlawfully obtained the privileges of U.S. citizenship by concealing horrible criminal acts,” said Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate of the Justice Department’s Civil Division. “The Department will continue to protect the integrity of the citizenship process and hold accountable those who defraud our immigration system.”
Singh entered the U.S. in February 1992 as a visitor for a temporary period not to exceed six months. He then remained in the country without authorization for years, until a family-based immigrant visa petition allowed him to become a permanent resident in June 2000, according to the Justice Department.
In May 2011, just weeks before he filed his application to naturalize as a U.S. citizen, Singh, a taxicab driver at the time, drove a female passenger who fell asleep during her ride home. When the passenger woke up, she found Singh on top of her with a knife against her throat. He threatened her, bound and gagged her, blindfolded her, removed her clothes and raped her. Afterward, the victim fled the cab and ran to someone in the street at dawn for help.
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Singh reportedly concealed details of the crime during the naturalization process. After naturalizing, Singh was convicted in New York of first-degree rape and second-degree kidnapping as a sexually motivated felony and sentenced to 20 years in prison.
The Aug. 26 order revoking Singh’s naturalization follows a complaint the Justice Department filed Feb. 2. The case was prosecuted by Trial Attorney Christopher Lyerla of the Civil Division’s Office of Immigration Litigation and Assistant U.S. Attorney Layaliza Soloveichik for the Eastern District of New York.