A former worker at the Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration has been sentenced to 15 months in federal prison for her part in a scheme in which people bought fraudulent Maryland driver’s licenses.
Marion Rose Payne, 55, of Harwood, Maryland, will also serve three years of supervised release, the Office of U.S. Attorney for Maryland Erek Barron said in a statement Thursday. She was convicted of conspiracy to produce and transfer identification documents without lawful authority.
Prosecutors said Payne admitted in her plea agreement that between July 2015 and March 2016, she and another MVA worker in the Largo branch office would give driver’s licenses to people who they knew had shown fraudulent documents.
Those people were directed to the work stations of Payne and the other worker, who wasn’t identified, by Warner Antonio Portillo, 37, of Manassas, Virginia. He has pleaded guilty to his role in the scheme and is awaiting sentencing.
The applicants were unable to get legitimate driver’s licenses, often because they were in the country illegally, the prosecutors said. They’d pay Portillo and others between $800 and $5,000 for a license.
Portillo gave Payne at least $25,000 in cash and gifts for her role in the scheme, prosecutors said; she’ll have to forfeit that much as part of her sentence.
In all, prosecutors said, at least 276 fraudulent driver’s licenses were given out.