TRENTON, N.J. -- New Jersey authorities have indicted 36 people, including eight former employees of the Division of Motor Vehicle Services, on allegations that they took part in elaborate, underground networks that issued thousands of false driver's licenses during the last two years.

Authorities said Monday that the 36, all from central and northern New Jersey, had been indicted during the last three weeks on charges such as racketeering, bribery, money laundering, identity theft, forgery, and tampering with public records.

None has ties to suspected terrorist activity, officials said, but fake documentation was provided to thousands of people willing to pay up to $2,500. Most of those people were seeking the documents to remain in the country illegally.

The schemes, authorities said, could not have been executed without DMV insiders who helped street-level brokers or middlemen obtain necessary paperwork and ignored fraudulent activity in exchange for cash.

One division clerk allegedly produced more than 3,000 fraudulent licenses and permits, earning more than $100,000 in six to eight months - enough money, officials said, that the clerk did not feel it necessary to deposit her DMV paychecks into her bank account during that time.

"Identity theft goes to the heart and core of security," said Peter Harvey, director of the New Jersey Division of Criminal Justice.

"Once you have a driver's license from any state," Harvey said, "it gives you the ability to do almost anything - lease a vehicle, rent an apartment, buy a home, get a job. ... And if something goes wrong, how will you ever find that person?"

Detective Stephen Jones of the state police Document Fraud Squad described the schemes as "a systematic virus that was pervasive throughout the state," and that required the cooperation of a wide network of people.

Street brokers, he said, would operate in communities almost like businesses, competing for customers who wanted fake documents.

The brokers, in turn, would offer a variety of services, such as "runners," who would take the written driving test or road test in the name of those customers.

Sometimes, runners wouldn't even have to take the test because a DMV employee would have been paid to process the false paperwork.

The customer would go to the division only to take a picture for the license _ the final step in the process. And those customers were often shuttled there in vans provided by the brokers.

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(c) 2002, The Philadelphia Inquirer.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.
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