I am writing to get few other opinions on this matter.
Let me give you the specs first:
Enter the country: January 16th, 2001 with a tourist B1 Visa, got initial 6 months I-94. I overstayed my visa and end up marrying a American citizen on September 22, 2005.
My sponsor was her Mom.
I received my conditional green card January 18th, 2007. We had 2 interviews to get the green card. The second one was a stoke interview. The answers matched 100%!
Things with my wife went south after the second year, and after she cheated on me..we decide not to be together anymore. Although we still lived together we stopped having sexual relations in/around January/2008. I started dating other people since then. on July/2008 I joined the US military
I went for training for 5 months and came back November 25th.
After I got the CG I left the country 4 times. All for business purposes. I first went to Brazil (my country of birth), spent 1 month. Came back to the
States for one week, went back to Brazil and stayed another 2 months and half. I also went to Canada for 3 days. This all happened in 2007, beginning of 2008.
In July of last year (2008), I had to go back to Brazil for 1 week. This happened one week before my due date to ship for military basic training.
Here is where start to get interesting:
On the way back from that trip, the Immigration Officer, at the re-entering, stopped me at the Atlanta international airport, and start making all sort of
questions, like what is your name, what is the name of your wife, where do you live, what is the name of your mother in law, etc. He looked puzzled that I got all the questions right, so he called another officer over and told him everything was ok... They went on to research my luggage.
On the process of researching my luggage, he found pictures of another girl, by herself. Remember that i said that we started dating other people? this was a picture of a girl that I started dating a month before. I will save you the story of how the pictures got in there...
They asked who the girl was, and I said is someone that I was dating... They asked if my wife new it... I said no. They asked me how much I paid my wife to marry me.. I said nothing. He said I looked like a inteligent person and how come I had so much money in my account, how come I had such a good credit, and she had nothing and bad credit? This was a big fat lie from them. My wife and I were in big financial problems, and at the time the officer told me that, my account was negative. Although I am not proud of this, Both of our credits are horrible
I was so tired... the trip from Brazil took 15 hours and I just missed my 6 hour flight back to California. But the officers weren't satisfied, they sent me
to another room, with a camera, where another immigration officer came in and started with the following speach:
Officer: I will be straight up with you. We have received a phone call saying that you paid U$ 15000.00 to marry your wife.
me: I never had that kind of money
Officer: when was the last time you have talked to your wife?
me: few days before I left for the brazilian trip
officer: so If I call your wife right now, she will confirm that.
me: She should, it is the truth. But don't tell here about the fotos you found in my luggage. It is not your problem, it is mine.
Officer: So I am going to call her, and she will confirm what you just told me?
me: Yes sir, She obviously will, but again, don't mention the pictures... it is none of your business to get into that.
Officer: Ok then
After that, he let me go, but before handling my green card back, he looked at me and he said:
Officer: What are you going to do when you green card expires?
me: I will file for an extension, I have the right to.
Officer: How come?
me: This is a true marriage, and according with our attorney, as long as we are in bona fide marriage, I have the right to stay here.
Officer: So you have already spoken to an Attorney hum? (this was in a very ironic tune)
me: Of course I have, we had an attorney that took care of our application process.
And as he gave my green card and passport back, he said "You are not going to be able to renew your green card". And that were his last words.
The officer never called my wife.
After I came back home, I told the entire story to my wife... including the pictures issue. I told her everything. We have never spoke about people that we were dating...at least I never did... but it was just a matter of time. We have good communication, we are not angry at each other, (although we are not talking productively either)
Now comes the second part of the story:
My wife and I hadn't filed for divorce, first because deep inside I probably thought we may get back together, and second because I joined the military, and had to leave for training. So we just started talking about it again when I came back, at the end of November/08.
So following recommendations of the Attorney. she (my wife) cooperated with me and signed for the petition to remove the conditions... We finally filed for the I-751 in January 2009, one week before the final date. In February We filed for divorce.
2 weeks later I received a letter from USICS extending my GC for another year. I also received a letter for the Biometrics, which I completed on February 17th. Few weeks after the biometrics appointment, I received another letter saying that I will have to go to another interview in my local office.
Now, according to a military lawyer, because I am in the military, I can apply for Citizenship at any time, not having to wait for that 3 years (married and
with a GC), or 5 years with a GC. I just got to be in status. So once I got the extension letter I applied for Citizenship (at the end of January/09).
Interesting enough, I received a letter scheduling my Citizenship interview for next month (may), but have not received the interview letter for the I-751
application.
Now my dilemma is: According with my current attorney, the reason he proposed signing jointly for the I-751 it was because I am in a law limbo. Since I am married, but not divorced, and since divorce takes about 6 months i here in california, filing jointly was the best option, because there is not an option for filing if I don't have a final divorce. He also said that, now, that I have to go to a new interview, my application will mostly like be denied, because my soon to be ex-wife already said she is not going to another interview.
So, my fear lays on the fact that I have applied jointly and I am not together with my wife... and I don't think USCIS knows that. And I don't have economic resources to pay for an attorney if my application gets denied... (It seems that I would have to appeal, go to hearings, etc)
So...what would be the best thing for me to do? withdraw the I-751 application right now and try to apply a waiver, ask more time for the judge? Should I withdraw the Citizenship application? or try to reschedule, to gain more time, so I could have the divorce finalized?
Any help would be extremely appreciated.
Cheers!
Let me give you the specs first:
Enter the country: January 16th, 2001 with a tourist B1 Visa, got initial 6 months I-94. I overstayed my visa and end up marrying a American citizen on September 22, 2005.
My sponsor was her Mom.
I received my conditional green card January 18th, 2007. We had 2 interviews to get the green card. The second one was a stoke interview. The answers matched 100%!
Things with my wife went south after the second year, and after she cheated on me..we decide not to be together anymore. Although we still lived together we stopped having sexual relations in/around January/2008. I started dating other people since then. on July/2008 I joined the US military
I went for training for 5 months and came back November 25th.
After I got the CG I left the country 4 times. All for business purposes. I first went to Brazil (my country of birth), spent 1 month. Came back to the
States for one week, went back to Brazil and stayed another 2 months and half. I also went to Canada for 3 days. This all happened in 2007, beginning of 2008.
In July of last year (2008), I had to go back to Brazil for 1 week. This happened one week before my due date to ship for military basic training.
Here is where start to get interesting:
On the way back from that trip, the Immigration Officer, at the re-entering, stopped me at the Atlanta international airport, and start making all sort of
questions, like what is your name, what is the name of your wife, where do you live, what is the name of your mother in law, etc. He looked puzzled that I got all the questions right, so he called another officer over and told him everything was ok... They went on to research my luggage.
On the process of researching my luggage, he found pictures of another girl, by herself. Remember that i said that we started dating other people? this was a picture of a girl that I started dating a month before. I will save you the story of how the pictures got in there...
They asked who the girl was, and I said is someone that I was dating... They asked if my wife new it... I said no. They asked me how much I paid my wife to marry me.. I said nothing. He said I looked like a inteligent person and how come I had so much money in my account, how come I had such a good credit, and she had nothing and bad credit? This was a big fat lie from them. My wife and I were in big financial problems, and at the time the officer told me that, my account was negative. Although I am not proud of this, Both of our credits are horrible
I was so tired... the trip from Brazil took 15 hours and I just missed my 6 hour flight back to California. But the officers weren't satisfied, they sent me
to another room, with a camera, where another immigration officer came in and started with the following speach:
Officer: I will be straight up with you. We have received a phone call saying that you paid U$ 15000.00 to marry your wife.
me: I never had that kind of money
Officer: when was the last time you have talked to your wife?
me: few days before I left for the brazilian trip
officer: so If I call your wife right now, she will confirm that.
me: She should, it is the truth. But don't tell here about the fotos you found in my luggage. It is not your problem, it is mine.
Officer: So I am going to call her, and she will confirm what you just told me?
me: Yes sir, She obviously will, but again, don't mention the pictures... it is none of your business to get into that.
Officer: Ok then
After that, he let me go, but before handling my green card back, he looked at me and he said:
Officer: What are you going to do when you green card expires?
me: I will file for an extension, I have the right to.
Officer: How come?
me: This is a true marriage, and according with our attorney, as long as we are in bona fide marriage, I have the right to stay here.
Officer: So you have already spoken to an Attorney hum? (this was in a very ironic tune)
me: Of course I have, we had an attorney that took care of our application process.
And as he gave my green card and passport back, he said "You are not going to be able to renew your green card". And that were his last words.
The officer never called my wife.
After I came back home, I told the entire story to my wife... including the pictures issue. I told her everything. We have never spoke about people that we were dating...at least I never did... but it was just a matter of time. We have good communication, we are not angry at each other, (although we are not talking productively either)
Now comes the second part of the story:
My wife and I hadn't filed for divorce, first because deep inside I probably thought we may get back together, and second because I joined the military, and had to leave for training. So we just started talking about it again when I came back, at the end of November/08.
So following recommendations of the Attorney. she (my wife) cooperated with me and signed for the petition to remove the conditions... We finally filed for the I-751 in January 2009, one week before the final date. In February We filed for divorce.
2 weeks later I received a letter from USICS extending my GC for another year. I also received a letter for the Biometrics, which I completed on February 17th. Few weeks after the biometrics appointment, I received another letter saying that I will have to go to another interview in my local office.
Now, according to a military lawyer, because I am in the military, I can apply for Citizenship at any time, not having to wait for that 3 years (married and
with a GC), or 5 years with a GC. I just got to be in status. So once I got the extension letter I applied for Citizenship (at the end of January/09).
Interesting enough, I received a letter scheduling my Citizenship interview for next month (may), but have not received the interview letter for the I-751
application.
Now my dilemma is: According with my current attorney, the reason he proposed signing jointly for the I-751 it was because I am in a law limbo. Since I am married, but not divorced, and since divorce takes about 6 months i here in california, filing jointly was the best option, because there is not an option for filing if I don't have a final divorce. He also said that, now, that I have to go to a new interview, my application will mostly like be denied, because my soon to be ex-wife already said she is not going to another interview.
So, my fear lays on the fact that I have applied jointly and I am not together with my wife... and I don't think USCIS knows that. And I don't have economic resources to pay for an attorney if my application gets denied... (It seems that I would have to appeal, go to hearings, etc)
So...what would be the best thing for me to do? withdraw the I-751 application right now and try to apply a waiver, ask more time for the judge? Should I withdraw the Citizenship application? or try to reschedule, to gain more time, so I could have the divorce finalized?
Any help would be extremely appreciated.
Cheers!
