A Milwaukee resident who served in a police unit during the Bosnian War has been charged with immigration fraud in connection with his admission into the U.S., first as a refugee, and later as a permanent resident. According to the criminal complaint filed by the U.S. Department of Justice, 46 year-old Mladjen Cvinjanovic possessed an alien registration receipt card, commonly known as a “green card,” which had been obtained by fraud. The complaint alleges that Cvijanovic served with a police unit in Bosnia-Herzegovina before and during the massacre of thousands of Bosnian Muslims in and around Srebrenica in July 1995. Because the police units were subordinated to the military during the conflict, Cvijanovic and his unit were dispatched to the war zone to provide military support to Bosnian Serb forces.
In 2002, Cvijanovic allegedly lied about and concealed his occupation as a police officer in Bosnia-Herzegovina and his true residency when applying for (and ultimately obtaining) refugee status in the United States. The complaint further alleges that in 2003, when applying for permanent residency, Cvijanovic again lied about and concealed his service as a police officer and about where he had been living before coming to the U.S., falsely claiming that he had been living in Serbia. Under the law, the definition of refugee does not include anyone who ordered, incited, assisted, or otherwise participated in the persecution of any person on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinion.