This isn’t the first time legal complaints have been filed against for-profit colleges and universities. That’s becoming fairly common place. But when the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York singles out individuals, that represents a new phase in for-profit litigation.
Three executives were sentenced last week for their role in student visa and financial aid fraud at the New Yor-area for-profit schools Micropower Career Institute and Institute for Health Education. Suresh Hiranandaney is the president of Micropower Career Institute, Anita Chabria is the MCI vice president and site director for one of five MCI campuses, and Lalit Chabria is chief executive officer at MCI as well as president of Institute of Health Education.
According to the press release announcing their sentencing, the three were charged for “their roles in a student financial aid fraud scheme in which they defrauded the United States Department of Education of $1,000,000 in education grant funds, and in a student visa fraud scheme that generated $7,440,000 in illegal revenues.”
International students enrolled at MCI and IHE and were allowed to stay in the United States on student visas. Hiranandaney and others collected student tuition money and certified that the schools were legitimate learning institutions. In reality, however, they were just providing a way for students to get to the U.S. — many students were not even attending courses. Immigration services were never informed of delinquencies in attendance.