A Vietnamese man living in Braintree, Massachusetts, has been sentenced to 25 months in prison for passport fraud and aggravated identity theft. Truong Nguyen, also known as “John Doe,” used the identity of a deceased child to work as a paramedic and firefighter. He attended the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy and was employed at the Melrose Fire Department under the victim’s name.
Nguyen, 50, was sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge Denise J. Casper and is subject to deportation after serving his sentence. In March 2025, he pleaded guilty to charges related to using false identities to avoid deportation due to a previous felony conviction from 1991.
U.S. Attorney Leah B. Foley stated that Nguyen had illegally resided in the United States for over three decades by assuming false identities. “Such identity fraud undermines the integrity of our identification systems,” she said.
Matthew O’Brien, Special Agent in Charge of the U.S. Department of State’s Diplomatic Security Service Boston Field Office, emphasized the importance of deterring passport and visa fraud for national security.
In March 2023, Nguyen applied for a passport using the deceased child’s information at a post office in Weymouth. The application raised suspicions when federal law enforcement verified that the victim had died in Boston in 2002 at age 13.
Further investigation revealed that Nguyen obtained multiple government-issued IDs using the victim’s identity since June 2018 and worked as an EMT before joining the fire department.
Nguyen was previously involved with two separate identities according to facial recognition technology used during an RMV fraud hearing in August 2018.
Court records show that Nguyen entered the United States from Vietnam as a Legal Permanent Resident (LPR) in 1979 but lost this status following a burglary conviction in 1991. Despite being ordered deported, he remained in the country and faced additional legal issues including embezzlement charges while working with Norwell Firefighters Union.
The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Suzanne Sullivan Jacobus with support from local police departments and district attorney offices.
