The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts released video in which alleged sham-marriage ringleader Jennifer Gonzalez describes a pay-for-play operation that prosecutors say generated more than $6 million.
Authorities accuse Gonzalez of arranging fraudulent marriages between U.S. citizens and illegal immigrants, charging as much as $40,000 for each marriage.
In the recording, made by a witness cooperating with federal investigators, Gonzalez appears to explain how the alleged green card marriage scheme operated.
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“They will come, I will present them to the wife, they’re like, ‘Yes, I want them, not a problem, I’ll be back in, I don’t know, three weeks.’ And they would leave and make me hold these girls for months,” Gonzalez said.
A screenshot from a U.S. Attorney’s Office video shows Jennifer Gonzalez describing how her alleged green card marriage scheme worked. (U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts)
“The payment, it’s agreed by both parties, OK? This is the first initial payment for the total amount of $38,000. Now, let me calculate that real quick. So $38,000 minus $3,000,” she said while using a calculator. “That’s going to give us $35,000. And then the day of the wedding, you have to bring me, what? $12,000.
“You and I are the ones in this contract, not nobody else. Because we don’t want to get your wife and yourself into a… putting in paper about a fake marriage. You know what I mean? Does that make sense to you? Because if anything happened, we don’t want them to have any proof that this was fake,” she said.
Photos released by the Department of Justice show alleged co-conspirator Jessica Tavares marrying an illegal immigrant from Brazil in May 2018. (Department of Justice)
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Gonzalez also told the cooperating witness, whom she believed to be an illegal immigrant, that Massachusetts was the best destination because of its sanctuary-state status.
“Massachusetts is best place for you to be. That is a fact,” Gonzalez said.
“You get health insurance. You get a lot of help as an immigrant here,” she said, adding, “Trump doesn’t like this state because…the state defends us very much.”
She also said she stopped arranging the marriages around 2025 as federal immigration enforcement intensified.
Gonzalez told the witness that she owned several properties in the Dominican Republic, which she referred to as “my country,” as well as in Puerto Rico.
“Miss Gonzalez got rich off selling the American dream, all the while investing her money in another country,” Leah Foley, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Massachusetts, told reporters at a Wednesday news conference announcing the alleged scheme.
U.S. Attorney Leah Foley announces the arrests of six people accused of arranging sham marriages over the past decade in a scheme prosecutors say generated millions of dollars, during a news conference on Oct. 21, 2025, in Boston. (AP Photo/Michael Casey)
Prosecutors identified Gonzalez as the alleged ringleader and said authorities had arrested four other co-conspirators linked to the operation.
