No! The crime is not being in the country illegally. The crime is knowingly enrolling in a fake university and claiming student visa status while taking no course work.
A sting operation (fake drug buy) is not entrapment. If you walk up to someone and ask them if they want to buy drugs and they do it’s not entrapment. If you threaten them to buy your drugs or pretend you are selling them legal drugs and then hand them something illegal and arrest them, that is entrapment.
But (assuming the recruiters weren't in on it), the students could be under the impression they were allowed to stay.
And so not have done anything to prevent them being in the country illegally.
>Students knew that the scheme was illegal, "and that discretion should be used when discussing the program with others,” prosecutors wrote in their indictment, which was filed Jan. 15 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan.
Not sure if this is actually true but that's what it says in the article.
