Immigrants Say They Were Swindled By A Lovable Character
By: Gerri L. Elder
Sergio Pinto once played a lovable neighborhood character on "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood" but now immigrants are complaining that he is anything but lovable and call him a crook.
hen Pinto lived in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania he ran a restaurant, was an actor and owned a translation business. As an immigrant from Guatemala himself, he moved to Tampa, Florida in 2001 to help other immigrants and himself as there was a greater need for his translation services there.
Pinto was beyond broke and deep in debt when he moved to Tampa, hoping to earn more money than he had in Pittsburgh. However, his financial situation did not improve and soon he was evicted from his apartment because he could not pay the rent.
It was then that he reportedly decided that he had to expand his business in some way in order to bring in some cash. According to a report by Tampa Bay Online, Pinto began targeting illegal immigrants and promising them that for $6,000 he could help them get a work permit and legalize their status in the United States.
Immigrants from Colombia, Guatemala and Mexico say that they were taken by Pinto's scheme. According to the immigrants, Pinto continued collecting money from illegal immigrants up until at least 2007; however by last year he had dropped his price from $6,000 a person down to $2,000. The immigrants all say that they received nothing from Pinto in return for their money.
Pinto says that he attempted to act as an intermediary to secure work permits for the illegal immigrants but that the failure was not his fault. He blames it on a woman named Kenya Flores.
According to Pinto, Flores had promised to obtain the work permits through an immigration office in Orlando but then disappeared before making good on the promise. He denies that he has been taking money from immigrants for years.
It is against the law in the United States for people who are not lawyers to provide legal advice. Pinto is not an immigration lawyer, and therefore it would be a felony for him to give legal advice to illegal immigrants. However, several immigrants interviewed by TBO seem to indicate that Pinto offered them legal services to obtain legal status and said that his plan was a part of the "federal public defender."
Pinto is highly praised by the legal community in Tampa for his work as a translator. Those who know him and work with him say that they would be shocked if the allegations made against him by the immigrants are true. However the immigrants are sticking to their stories about Pinto and say that he got their hopes up about work permits and legal immigration status and then simply robbed them.