Green Card and 2 Misdemeanors ...

C

Calico

New Member
Hello, hopefully someone will be able to enlighten me with this situation I have. Actually, this is my boyfriend’s situation…

He came to the US when he was 6 or 7. He applied for citizenship when he was older, but was denied due to having physical altercation with his neighbor when he was 19. That was his first misdemeanor and never got expunged. He is currently 26 (going on 27) and his green card is about to expire.

Couple weeks ago he was pulled over by an officer for speeding. He found out from the officer that his license has been suspended for the past two years. He was told that there was an unpaid traffic ticket.

He has a court date in July. From what I have researched, driving on suspended license is a misdemeanor in the State of California. The court can jail him and/or fine him and/or make him do community services. I am going to ask him to talk to an attorney who can represent him and persuade the judge to sentence him to pay fines instead of sending him to a county jail or doing community services.

Now, with two misdemeanors on his record, would he be able to apply for citizenship and will they accept him? I read somewhere that he may have to wait 5+ years to apply. If that is the case, will he be able to renew his Green Card with two misdemeanors?

If he gets deported, he is going to a country that he cannot speak the language. Once deported, he will not be able to re-enter the States for 7 to 10 years, right?

Any advices and suggestions are greatly appreciated!!
I'm sorry for the long thread and thank you very much for your time!
 
For the impact on citizenship, ask in the US citizenship section.

For renewing his green card, one or two misdemeanors are unlikely to cause a problem. There are some misdemeanors that are deportable offenses, especially if there's more than one, but the determination of whether a misdemeanor is deportable would require looking more deeply into the details of the offenses involved and comparing them to the relevant sections of the law, which is usually not done for green card renewal but they will do that for citizenship.
 
Thank you very much for your quick reply.

As for your second comment, it was not really called for. I am insulted. Actually, could you please take your comment back? I was born and raised in California. I rather have my boyfriend work for his citizenship than getting the "easy way out" by marrying me.
 
OK, deleted. But please invite the affected person himself to post directly.

Usually when somebody's first post is about a friend with a criminal background, it's really themselves they're talking about ..... eventually after a number of messages back and forth it often becomes more obvious. That is disrespectful to those who might be giving their answers to help.

Marrying you won't provide an "easy way out" as far as citizenship is concerned ... if his crimes are classified as deportable offenses, it doesn't help if he's married to a US citizen*. And if the offenses disqualify him from citizenship (but aren't bad enough for deportation), being married doesn't help either, except that for applicants married to a US citizen the "good moral character" requirement is focused on the last 3 years instead of the last 5.


*except in extreme hardship cases, like if you were totally paralyzed and relied on him to take care of you daily they might decide against deporting him, but that still wouldn't make them grant citizenship because he doesn't need citizenship to be in the US with you.
 
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Thank you.
I just wanted to help, but there's really nothing I can do (except nag him to work on the situation.)
I did not mean to cause any disrespect.
 
He'll be able to renew his GC.

But if he applies for citizenship, urge him to consult a lawyer to go over the details of his offenses and figure out the likely result of applying for citizenship, whether it would be approval, denial but maintain the green card, or deportation.

Did any of his parents become citizens? If yes, and it happened before he turned 18, he may have already automatically become a citizen.
 
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