UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 19-4850 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. RICHA NARANG, Defendant - Appellant. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, at Alexandria. Leonie M. Brinkema, District Judge. (1:16-cr-00043-LMB-5) Argued: May 7, 2021 Decided: August 9, 2021 Before FLOYD, RICHARDSON, and QUATTLEBAUM, Circuit Judges. Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion. ARGUED: John Cady Kiyonaga, LAW OFFICE OF JOHN C. KIYONAGA, Alexandria, Virginia, for Appellant. Jack Hanly, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Alexandria, Virginia, for Appellee. ON BRIEF: Terrance G. Reed, LANKFORD & REED, PLLC, Alexandria, Virginia, for Appellant. G. Zachary Terwilliger, United States Attorney, Alexandria, Virginia, Richard D. Cooke, Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Richmond, Virginia, for Appellee. Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. PER CURIAM: Richa Narang appeals her conviction of conspiracy to commit visa fraud and two counts of visa fraud. Following a strange procedural history, Narang and the government tried these counts in a one-day bench trial. Narang now appeals, arguing both that the court lacked jurisdiction over the trial and that she was convicted based on insufficient evidence. We reject both of Narang’s arguments and affirm the judgment of the district court. I. The government’s prosecution centered on Narang’s role as a high-level employee of EcomNets—a Virginia corporation purportedly providing technology services while running a sophisticated visa fraud scheme. EcomNets’s business model involved sponsoring H-1B visa beneficiaries and then placing them with third-party vendors for a fee. The government alleged at trial that EcomNets’s business model depended on the submission of fraudulent applications for H-1B worker visas. The H-1B visa program is a temporary-worker program, which admits roughly 65,000 applicants annually to work in specialty occupations requiring a bachelor’s degree or its equivalent. 8 U.S.C. § 1184(g)(1)(A)(vii); 8 C.F.R. § 214.2(h)(4)(iii)(A). United States-based employers (the “petitioners”) file petitions on behalf of non-citizen workers (the “beneficiaries”) seeking U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) approval for a beneficiary to work for a petitioner in the United States. Before petitioners can file an H-1B petition with USCIS, they must first file a labor condition application (LCA) with the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) promising to pay 2 the beneficiary the prevailing wage for their occupational classification. See 8 U.S.C. § 1182(n)(1)(A)(i), (D). Once approved, the petitioner files a form I-129 with USCIS for adjudication, appending supporting documentation. USCIS adjudicators seek to determine whether there is a genuine employer-employee relationship between the petitioner and the beneficiary. Because the H-1B visa is employment-based, adjudicators also look for evidence that the beneficiary’s employment will begin “at the time indicated on the [I-]129 petition.” J.A. 222–23. And adjudicators look for whether that employment will conform to the wage and location specifications in the LCA. USCIS scrutiny is even greater for staffing companies like EcomNets. J.A. 223 (USCIS adjudicator testimony noting that the agency “heavily examine[s] the employer- employee relationship” for staffing companies). There is no per se …
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