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by Matt CoughlinStaff Writer An interpreter who gave immigrants driving lessons is charged with also giving them answers to their PennDOT driving test.
Mostafa Wadud Jamal, 45, of Monroe Drive in Towamencin, is charged with 12 counts of tampering with public records, six counts of obstruction of justice, six counts of false swearing and six counts of making an unsworn falsification to authorities by forging or altering documents.
Jamal was an official interpreter for PennDOT through the Lutheran Children and Family Services agency and spoke Hindu, Bengali and Urdu, according to court records. He also owns and operates his own driving school, Deshi Driving School in Harleysville, state police said. As part of his services, Jamal sat with test-takers and translated the English language tests into Hindu, Bengali and Urdu.
State police got a tip that Jamal was providing people with answers during the driving tests and began investigating in June.
Jamal arranged to meet an undercover state trooper posing as a client in the Huntingdon Valley area June 20, police said. The trooper was fluent in a foreign language and pretended not to know English. The agreement with Jamal was that the undercover trooper would bring $644.50 with him to cover cash for Jamal and fees to get the license. Jamal drove them to the New World Association of Emigrants from Eastern Europe on Bustleton Avenue in Philadelphia. There, they met with an employee of LCFS who collected $130 and provided Jamal with a letter stating he was a valid interpreter and was assigned to translate for the client.
State police said Jamal then drove himself and the undercover trooper to the Huntingdon Valley Driver’s Licensing Center. Jamal read the questions in English without translating and then told the undercover trooper which answers to pick, according to court records. Following the exam, Jamal took $480 in payment for his services, police said. In addition to the undercover investigation, state police, working with the FBI, found five more people who said they were given correct answers to the driving test by Jamal in exchange for $500, according to court records.
Jamal was arrested in early August, arraigned before District Judge Paul Leo in Hatboro and posted $2,500 bail to be released. A preliminary hearing in the case has been continued, but no new date has been set.
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LCFS spokeswoman Janet Panning said the program that Jamal was involved in has been suspended in the wake of Jamal’s arrest and an investigation by Pennsylvania State Police and the FBI. Panning said LCFS is a multi-service agency that provides foster care, adoption and other services to refugees coming to the United States. They also provide some other forms of assistance to non-refugee immigrants.
Among the services, Panning said, LCFS provides refugees with a subcontracted interpreter for obtaining identification and drivers licensing free of charge. Prior to Jamal’s arrest, Panning said, they also provided non-client immigrants with interpreters for a fee. She said that to avoid cheating, LCFS pre-tested prospective drivers in their own language.
However, Panning said that was somehow circumvented.
She said Jamal was also able to continue to work as a subcontracted interpreter despite a background-check lapse. State police said Jamal had failed to keep up his criminal background and child abuse clearances and should not have been permitted to translate.
Panning said that LCFS has discontinued the program for non-client immigrants since Jamal’s arrest. She said PennDOT is expanding the number of languages the tests are given in, but for the time being there is a lack of translation services for immigrants seeking driver’s license testing. The LCFS employee who aided Jamal is no longer with LCFS, Panning said.
That employee has not been charged.
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FBI spokesman Frank Burton Jr. acknowledged the existence of an investigation, but said he could not comment further as the case was ongoing.
Last year, three interpreters and six others pleaded guilty in federal court to operating a scheme that allowed more than 300 people with fake documents to obtain commercial driver's licenses in the United States. A 10th person was found guilty following a trial. In that case the interpreters – Irina Peterson, 37, of Philadelphia, Iryna Starovoyt, 45, of Warrington, and Khrystyna Davyda, 25, of Northampton -- were providing clients with the answers to the written portion of the commercial driver’s license test.
The Civil Rights Act requires people with limited English-speaking skills to have “meaningful access” to PennDOT services, which is why interpreters are available for test takers.
Matt Coughlin: 215-345-3147; [email protected]; Twitter: @coughlinreports