Baker defends state fraud-spotting efforts

Gov. Charlie Baker is defending the state’s ability to detect identity fraud after he was slammed by a police officer for blowing off a training system that some 700 cops and government officials — including New Hampshire Registry of Motor Vehicles employees — are using to spot bogus documents.

Baker told the Herald yesterday the state has “ongoing training and people who work at the Registry on fraud intervention and fraud protection and fraud referral mechanisms all the time.”

Baker said state agencies are “constantly updating our fraud identification and fraud referral programs,” including working with a “number of nationally accredited organizations to ensure the people who work at the Registry of Motor Vehicles have access to the best and most successful information on how to do this.”

The Herald reported yesterday that high-level Baker officials took no action after they were pitched in March on “Identifying an Impostor,” a program embraced by numerous police departments in Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Rhode Island that has led to numerous arrests of people for using fraudulent IDs.

Saugus police officer James Scott trains officers and RMV employees on the telltale signs of stolen identities, typically made with Puerto Rican Social Security numbers bought on the black market as part of a fake ID “package.” Scott said he believes the Bay State’s Registry is loath to embrace his techniques because it would reveal widespread fraud and illegitimate licenses.

“They create the impostors. The impostor has to walk into the Registry and activate that stolen package,” he said.

Tewskbury police Chief Timothy Sheehan said two of his narcotics officers used the program’s teachings to nab two drug suspects last month and found they had received tens of thousands in MassHealth benefits using stolen Puerto Rican Social Security numbers.

The Registry has noted its use of facial recognition to ascertain identities. But Scott said that approach only catches people who have tried to get licenses in Massachusetts before, not newcomers.

In defending the current system, Baker pointed to reforms to ID verification procedures required by the federal Real ID Act of 2005, saying they will be fully implemented “probably by spring 2018.”

“We believe people in Massachusetts who aren’t here lawfully shouldn’t have access to driver’s licenses,” Baker said.