- Two California men pleaded guilty to H-1B fraud involving fake job positions at the University of California.
- The scheme redirected university-linked visa approvals to private sector clients through staffing companies.
- Defendants face up to five years in prison for depleting the limited pool of H-1B visas.
(DUBLIN, CALIFORNIA) – Sampath Rajidi and Sreedhar Mada, two Indian-origin men from Dublin in California’s East Bay, pleaded guilty on April 16, 2026, to conspiracy to commit H-1B visa fraud tied to fake job positions at the University of California.
Federal court records say the case centered on petitions that portrayed the University of California’s Agriculture and Natural Resources division as the intended employer for foreign workers, even though the jobs did not exist. After U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services approved the petitions, the visas went to other clients at private companies.
Both men are 51. Prosecutors said the arrangement let the defendants secure H-1B approvals under the name of a public university and then redirect those approvals for commercial use.
The conduct ran from June 2020 through January 2023. During that period, Rajidi and Mada submitted petitions for numerous foreign nationals, falsely stating that UC Agriculture and Natural Resources planned to hire them.
Rajidi operated S-Team Software Inc. and Uptrend Technologies LLC, two visa servicing companies that focused on obtaining foreign workers for temporary placement with various companies. Prosecutors said those businesses became the vehicle for moving approved workers to private-sector clients after USCIS signed off on petitions filed in the university’s name.
Mada served as Chief Information Officer of UC Agriculture and Natural Resources. Court records say he used that position to give the filings institutional credibility and to create the impression that the university itself sought to fill the roles described in the petitions.
That representation mattered because USCIS evaluates whether a petition describes a real job with a real employer. Court documents say both defendants knew the positions listed in the applications did not exist and still submitted information they understood would shape the agency’s decision.
The guilty pleas spell that out in the language prosecutors relied on. They submitted false information “knowing such information was material to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) decisions in granting visas,” according to court documents.
Records in the case also say Mada lacked authority to make the hires described in the filings. Although he held supervisory authority within his department, he could not hire H-1B workers there without approval from higher officials, and that approval was never obtained.
Federal authorities cast the scheme as more than a paperwork offense. By using nonexistent University of California positions to obtain approvals and then steering those approvals elsewhere, the conspiracy tapped a visa category that Congress caps each year and that employers compete heavily to access.
Court documents describe the effect in blunt terms: “As a result of their conspiracy, Rajidi and Mada gained an unfair advantage over other firms and depleted the pool of H-1B visas available to competing firms.” That pool, limited by the H-1B cap, is supposed to serve employers with genuine specialty-occupation jobs.
The facts laid out in the case place the defendants at two different points of the same process. Rajidi controlled companies that sourced workers and placements. Mada brought the name and standing of UC Agriculture and Natural Resources, which prosecutors said gave USCIS false confidence that the university was hiring for legitimate roles.
Investigators said the fraud worked because each side supplied something the other lacked. Rajidi’s firms handled visa servicing and relationships with outside companies, while Mada’s university title helped make the petitions appear credible enough to pass review.
The arrangement also illustrates how H-1B visa fraud can move through ordinary administrative channels when filings contain enough detail to resemble routine employment petitions. USCIS approved the petitions first; the reassignment of visas to other clients at private companies came after those approvals, according to the case.
That sequence is central to the government’s theory. Prosecutors did not describe a legitimate university recruitment effort that later changed course. They described a plan built from the start on jobs that were never real.
Both defendants now face a maximum statutory penalty of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. U.S. District Judge Troy L Nunley scheduled sentencing for July 30, 2026.
The case arrives as federal authorities widen scrutiny of abuse in the H-1B system. Prosecutors linked it to a broader campaign against fake applicants and complex fraud operations that use staffing companies, layered intermediaries and job offers that never materialize.
Officials have described that effort as a “zero tolerance policy towards H-1B Visa processing system to deny entry to fake applicants.” The same enforcement push has reached scams in which workers are promised one role and routed somewhere else, or never receive the job presented to immigration authorities.
What set this case apart was the use of a public university’s identity in the filings. University employers can carry weight with adjudicators because they signal established institutional oversight, defined job structures and an identifiable worksite, all of which can help a petition look ordinary on its face.
Prosecutors said Rajidi and Mada exploited exactly that perception. By attaching the petitions to UC Agriculture and Natural Resources, they made the applications look like hires for a recognized academic institution rather than placements arranged for private companies through staffing businesses.
The University of California name appears throughout the case because the alleged jobs sat inside one of its divisions, not because the court records describe a campus-wide hiring program. The filings specifically named UC Agriculture and Natural Resources, where Mada held his CIO post.
Rajidi’s companies, S-Team Software Inc. and Uptrend Technologies LLC, both operated in the market for temporary foreign labor placements. In the government’s account, those firms benefited once USCIS granted petitions that gave them access to workers they could place elsewhere.
That made the case not only a fraud prosecution but also a competition case within the H-1B market. Court documents say the conspiracy gave Rajidi and Mada an edge over firms seeking visas through lawful petitions for actual positions.
The H-1B program remains one of the most contested employment visa channels in the United States because the annual allotment is limited and demand routinely exceeds supply. In that setting, every approval tied to a fake role reduces the number available to employers with real openings.
Prosecutors relied on that scarcity to frame the harm. Their argument was not limited to false statements made to USCIS. It also focused on distortion of a capped system in which one fraudulent petition can displace one lawful petition.
The guilty pleas close the question of whether Rajidi and Mada took part in the conspiracy. Sentencing before Judge Nunley will determine how the court weighs the university connection, the length of the scheme, the role of the staffing companies and the effect on the H-1B pool reserved for legitimate employers.
