someone is due out of the penitentary very very soon, but she is an illegal alien (i didnt know until now!!) and her felony is cocaine related. EVERYONE WE CAN POSSIBLY THINK OF has been contacted, even one of the president’s aids. we cant find anyone willing to take this case because no one sees any way she’ll win. theyll send her back and she’ll never ever ever be able to enter the US again. im about to go insane, if anyone knows anyone to contact PLEASE let me know
another thing- this woman was brought over to the US when she was a baby. the person that brought her over was doing traveling- it was kind of like an adoption. so isnt this person a victim? isnt the one that did the “adopting” the one that should be in trouble? and shes about to go into a nursing home… i just KNOW theres gotta be a way!!
Well, you need an immigration attorney, and IANAL, but is there some way she could claim refugee status? Is her life in danger if she goes back? Otherwise, it doesn’t look likely she’ll be allowed to stay in the country. First, she’s here illegally, which doesn’t help. Secondly, she’s committed a felony, which doesn’t help either. Good luck, and let me know, but…
the INS issued an “order to show cause”, and with that was a list of free legal services she could use. we’ve contacted everyone on that paper and no one will do it. not even for money. talked to a lot of other people too…nothing. she was supposed to be pardoned by the ohio governor, i dont know whats happened with that.
im supposed to find a case like this thats been done before, where they managed to get away from being deported. then we can use that as a legal precedent. im not moving from this spot until i find something… anyone got any #s or sites, thatd be nice…
andros- i dont know what it had to do with cocaine. i guess i can see where youre coming from, but this is my MOTHER. she is a brilliant woman, shes human like the rest of us.
Which governor was supposed to have pardoned her? Taft? Voinovich? Celeste?
You might want to track down the source of that statement and see if you can find out 1) if it was true and 2) why it did not happen. (If the governor was Celeste, start making travel plans; he has been gone too long and angered too many people with the pardons he did issue. If the governor was Voinovich and the pardon just got “lost” in his move to D.C., maybe he’ll flex his senatorial muscle to help. If the story turns out to be false, then abandon it and don’t repeat it; it makes it look like you’re inventing things.)
[sarcasm]
Hmmm. Illegal alien? Coke Trafficing? Shit! Send her up here to Canada! Quick! She sounds like the type countries will be climbing overthemselves to have as a citizen!
[/sarcasm]
She’s your mom and you don’t know why she’s in jail? Find out, ASAP, and let us know. Believe it or not, it can make a difference in whether or not she might be allowed to stay in the country.
regarding your other question, the one about the person who brought her into the country illegally - you mention she was a ‘baby’ at the time and she’s your mom, therefore, that event (the bringing her into the country illegally) was a long time ago. The only crime I’m aware of that doesn’t have a statute of limitations, is murder (IOW, even if it was illegal, it was so long ago that person couldn’t be charged with a crime).
Now, IANAL, either, I assume you have spoken with some by now. was your mom aware of her non citizenship status? did she ever have a social security card? vote? that sort of thing? Did she ever have her birth certificate? adoption papers? marriage license?
It doesn’t matter if the statute of limitations on the crime is two days: the woman is still in the very act of committing the crime. To wit: she is, at this very moment, an illegal alien. She is, at this very moment, in this country without lawful authority. And until she has such lawful authority, she shall continue to be in the very act of committing the crime of being in the country without such lawful authority.
And, actually, it really doesn’t matter to whom she’s related: she’s committed a felony and current law provides for ejection of aliens (even those with “green cards”) who have committed felonies or crimes of violence, IIRC. There’re plenty of news stories regarding this. I’ll try to remember to post a few shortly if the board ever speeds up.
Monty I may have read the OP’s question incorrectly, but I gathered that the question went like : ‘Mrs. Smith’ (picking a name to make the illustration more clear) brought mom into the country when she (mom) was a baby, and Mrs. Smith is therefore the person who did wrong, and shouldn’t they be going after her?
My answer was that the ‘Mrs. Smith’'s crime had long passed the time to prosecute.
The rest of the stuff I was going after was to attempt to discern if this woman had had any clear idea of her citizenship status her whole life. With the hope (no knowledge mind you, but hope) that if she’d erroneously believed her whole life that she was a legal citizen, then some grandfather type clause might come into play. OTOH, if, for example, she’d never worked and had a social security number (how the hell do you exist in this country w/o one? you have to fill it in for credit cards, bank accounts, taxes, wages etc etc), then she probably knew her status.
OK? (I know that the ‘illegal’ act of being an illegal alien is a current and continuous action) (where did you get the idea that I cared about who this person was related to, other than to describe her as the OP’s mom?)
Sorry, I was addressing the 2nd part in answer to another poster.
Back when I was on Active Duty and was a Passport Agent, I actually had occasion (right down the road in Monterey, California!) to receive an application from an individual (approximately age 32 years) whose mother brought her into the country illegally some years ago. The individual in question wanted to get a passport (to prove US citizenship, of course) and she was quite upset that I did not just take her word for it that she was born in California. Once she became aware of her lack of legal status, the responsibility for maintaining such lack became hers, thus she may have started her illegal residence in this country due to her mother’s action but her continued illegal residence was of her own volition.
Let me know if you want the entire conversation posted here, it was a short one.
Monty I believe you and I are kinda saying the same thing. The questions I was asking (about marriage license, social security card, voters reg etc.) was an attempt to discover if the IA knew of her citizenship issue. It’s possible to me (not likely, but possible) that she’d grown up assuming that she was a citizen. If she’d never been married, never applied for a Social Security card etc, it’s possible she didn’t know. And if she didn’t know, then that might be of some help in the situation.
Naturally, if she’d known all these years of her status and had failed to do anything about it (until now when she’s being threatened with deportation), then well, that’s why one should take care of such things.
I hate to sound rude, especially to a new poster, but I think the time for a lawyer was PRIOR to the felony conviction. Immigration takes a very dim view of any conviction, even a minor one.
Unless Clinton himself pardoned her, she’s probably screwed, and won’t be able to petition to come back for at least 7 years, if I remember correctly.
wring & Monty are doing a great job of debating this, but I find it hard, if not impossible, to believe that anyone who has lived in the US for any significant length of time hasn’t tried at least once to get a legitimate job. This job search would have resulted in a request by the potential employer for proof of the ability to work in this country.
This request would alert a reasonably intelligent person to wonder where their papers were, and to start poking around.
EJsGirl, you have hit the nail on the head about legitimate employers. Sadly, though, there are far too many employers who are willing to hire folks “under the table” so they will avoid the added expenses incurred by honest employers. These expenses, of course, are Social Security, Unemployment Insurance, and income taxes, just to name a few. An even greater incentive to the scum of the earth dishonest employer is the fact that the employer can get away without paying minimum wage or taking care of the employee in the event of injury or death.
While the local and State police forces are not in the business of enforcing immigration laws, they are in the business of enforcing other laws. Thus the recent sweep in which a group of illegal aliens were arrested when they were harassing school girls. The consequences of their additional illegal act (additional to being in the country illegally) followed like dominoes falling.
Last, if anyone has gone to get a driver’s license recently, then that individual is fully aware of what his or her immigration/residency status is. At least in California, he or she is aware. This State requires proof of lawful residence in the country to obtain a driver’s license.
p.s. Immigration status has nothing to do with marriage eligibility here; however, it does in certain other countries (Philippines, Japan, Korea, Germany) for foreign nationals.
