I had a cruise scheduled to depart Vancouver on August the 8th. My traveling companion and I had arrived on Thursday as our earlier flight had been canceled and we did not want to arrive Friday and miss the departure. The immigration line was quite long as our flight had arrived around 1 P.M. It took about an hour to get to an official's desk. He had motioned for me to come up also as my friend had indicated that he was traveling with someone. He checked both of our passports and wrote stuff on the immigration form and were told to proceed.
We picked up our luggage and handed the official at the walkway our forms and were told to go to the search room. It was there that another official started asking us if we had a criminal record. My friend has none but I have one and I indicated to him that I was convicted of a misdemeanor in 1997. He left and was gone for some time and then came back. He asked me if I had been convicted of any other crimes and I told him that I was convicted of two minor felonies in 1986 and one minor felony in 1989. He left again and was gone for some time. I imagine that he was comparing the U.S. convictions to Canadian criminal law.
When he came back, he started asking me for details about the 1997 conviction, which was a more serious misdemeanor. He also wanted to know what the disposition was and the conditions of my probation, which would have ended in December of 1999. He left and finally came back and said that he could not allow me to enter into Canada. He gave me a document to sign that stated that he was "allowing" me to withdraw my application for visa and leave Canada immediately.
Both my friend and I are think that they did not know about the 1997 conviction since it was a misdemeanor and it didn't result in prison time. He also came back and asked me for details and instead of documenting a denial, he just documented that he was "allowing" me to withdraw my visa. Would we be correct in this assumption? There are many people with convictions of misdemeanors in there past and so if that was the case, that might disqualify many people from entering Canada.
He gave me the web site for Canadian immigration law and I have been reading it and found out that I can apply for redemption if at least 5 years has passed since the completion of the sentence for the conviction. That application costs 200 dollars to file and might cost as much as 1000 if it has to go to the highest official in their agency. What might it cost for me to hire an attorney to do this for me?
So we had to miss the departure from Vancouver and the cruise line would not even allow us to catch the ship at their first stop in Alaska because of a maritime law that states that if a ship is embarking and departing at two different ports, the two ports must be different county ports. We lost allot of money on this as insurance will not cover it. I am very unhappy about this whole experience as this was to be my first trip outside the U.S. Any guidance that you can give me would be much appreciated.
We picked up our luggage and handed the official at the walkway our forms and were told to go to the search room. It was there that another official started asking us if we had a criminal record. My friend has none but I have one and I indicated to him that I was convicted of a misdemeanor in 1997. He left and was gone for some time and then came back. He asked me if I had been convicted of any other crimes and I told him that I was convicted of two minor felonies in 1986 and one minor felony in 1989. He left again and was gone for some time. I imagine that he was comparing the U.S. convictions to Canadian criminal law.
When he came back, he started asking me for details about the 1997 conviction, which was a more serious misdemeanor. He also wanted to know what the disposition was and the conditions of my probation, which would have ended in December of 1999. He left and finally came back and said that he could not allow me to enter into Canada. He gave me a document to sign that stated that he was "allowing" me to withdraw my application for visa and leave Canada immediately.
Both my friend and I are think that they did not know about the 1997 conviction since it was a misdemeanor and it didn't result in prison time. He also came back and asked me for details and instead of documenting a denial, he just documented that he was "allowing" me to withdraw my visa. Would we be correct in this assumption? There are many people with convictions of misdemeanors in there past and so if that was the case, that might disqualify many people from entering Canada.
He gave me the web site for Canadian immigration law and I have been reading it and found out that I can apply for redemption if at least 5 years has passed since the completion of the sentence for the conviction. That application costs 200 dollars to file and might cost as much as 1000 if it has to go to the highest official in their agency. What might it cost for me to hire an attorney to do this for me?
So we had to miss the departure from Vancouver and the cruise line would not even allow us to catch the ship at their first stop in Alaska because of a maritime law that states that if a ship is embarking and departing at two different ports, the two ports must be different county ports. We lost allot of money on this as insurance will not cover it. I am very unhappy about this whole experience as this was to be my first trip outside the U.S. Any guidance that you can give me would be much appreciated.
