Court limits use of ID theft law

WASHINGTON, May 4 (UPI) -- The U.S. Supreme Court Monday limited the use of a federal law on identity theft against people who use false Social Security numbers to get work.

In a unanimous ruling, the court struck down a provision that had been widely used by prosecutors in immigration cases, finding that workers who use fake Social Security numbers in the commission of some other crimes may not be subject to an extra two years on their prison terms for aggravated identity theft, unless they know the numbers belong to an actual person, The New York Times reported.

Prosecutors have used the threat of extra prison time as leverage to gain guilty pleas on lesser charges, the newspaper said.

Justice Samuel Alito said in a concurring opinion the government's interpretation of the law meant criminal liability would be left up to chance. If a defendant has chosen a Social Security number randomly, Alito wrote, and "it turns out that the number belongs to a real person … two years will be added to the defendant's sentence, but if the defendant is lucky and the number does not belong to another person, the statute is not violated."

Chuck Roth of the National Immigrant Justice Center said the ruling "preserves basic ideals of fairness for some of our society's most vulnerable workers."

"An immigrant who uses a false Social Security number to get a job doesn't intend to harm anyone, and it makes no sense to spend our tax dollars to imprison them for two years," he said.