A woman who went to the United States Embassy with a fake passport to obtain a visa, was fined in the Corporate Area Resident Magistrate's Court on Wednesday.

Cadesha Wilson, 27, house-keeper of All Man Hill, Above Rocks, St Catherine, pleaded guilty to forgery and uttering forged documents.

Allegations say on March 6, the accused went to the embassy to apply for a non-immigration visa. She presented all the relevant documents, which included a Jamaican passport in the name, Samantia Letts.

The passport office was contacted and it was discovered that the passport was on a list of illegally issued passport. The Fraud Squad was contacted and Wilson was questioned and later charged. Wilson told the court that her aunt told her in 2001, before she died, of a contact where she could obtain the fraudulent birth papers so she could get a passport. She said she needed the birth papers because she had previously overstayed the one-day time limit given by the immigration office in England by a year, and felt that she would be denied the US visa.

She told the court she paid $35,000 for the birth certificate and $1,500 for the passport in 2002.

Wilson's lawyer intervened on her behalf and noted that this was her first offence, but RM Glen Brown fined her $25,000 or six months for forgery and $25,000 or six months for uttering forged documents.