Choosing a lawyer

[obiwan]

Good Day,

Does it matter whether you hire a lawyer (Filipino) who is from your home country (logic being that he is more familiar with the schools/background you went to in your home country, hence it would be easier for him to prepare your applications), as compared to a different nationality (Indian) who I beleive has better credentials?

i guess what i mean is that is it better to hire a lawyer from your own country as compared to one who is in the US (where there would be no face to face contact)?

i am scouting for a lawyer to handle my H1B and I have seen so many reputable Indian law firms in the US (Rajiv, Murthy etc.) which i believe are better than what is available in the Philippines.

Is knowlegde of your country and face to face contact important?

any opinion would be greatly appreciated.

thanks

 

[Jim Mills]

I don't think it matters. Familiarity with different universities around the world sometimes comes with time in the field, but even if it doesn't, the credential evaluator handles that and as long as I can get an expert opinion that the credentials are equivalent from a recognized evaluation service, it doesn't matter what university or country the actual degree comes from. I have rarely seen a credential evaluation challenged (I can only think of once in about 2000 cases) and when it has been challenged, I sent 2 more evaluations from different evaluators saying the same thing. Three experts saying the same thing is difficult for USCIS to argue with. I don't know whether the degree was equivalent or not but the experts said that it was. USCIS wouldn't care about my opinion anyway. Regardless of what country I was from.