What could be the repercussions for a lawyer who signs a persons passport application and certifies a photograph to be a true likeness of the applicant when it turns out the person presented a birth certificate and therefore a name which was not theirs?
Did I get the right forum?
See …
Pay particular attention to the bottom of the page:
Is this in the United States?
Why was the photo and application submitted to a lawyer rather than an acceptance agent like the post office, or to a consulate or passport office?
Lurker - no the Caribbean.
Sorry for not being clear - the application has to be signed by a person of good standing and then goes to the passport office. Is that not how it’s done in the US? It’s common practice here, you would get a dentist, headteacher, pastor etc to sign the form and the back of the photo. You then present your birth certificate and other relevant docs such as marriage cert etc, the signed application, passport photo (signed on the back by the good citizen) and the passport office then issues the passport.
John Doe gets hold of Robert Roes birth certificate - he gets Lawyer Dupe to sign the application - gets caught and gets jail. Lawyer Dupe says he thought John Doe was Robert Roe all along. Can Lawyer Dupe wriggle out on this defence?
I wonder - it will all be in court here soon - I realise these are US laws, but I can’t see the law here being too different.
I’m not sure I understand. Is the application supposed to be signed by any random person of good standing, or is the person signing some sort of statement that he personally knows the applicant and that this is his name and photo?
The application is signed by any random person of good standing, in the part of the application form that asks him/her to declare that s/he personally knows the applicant and that this is his name and photo - this guarantor also signs the back of the photo.
It’s standard application procedure in England & Ireland - is the procedure different where you are?
So it’s not supposed to be signed by just any person of good standing, but one who personally knows the applicant? And Lawyer Dupe signed the application and photo falsely stating that that he personally knows Robert Roe and that this is his name and passport? I don’t know what the repercussions will be for Lawyer Dupe, but there will be some.
Application procedure in the US is that the application form is completed, and the applicant must go in person to an acceptance facility with 2 photos, proof of citizenship, and photo ID. It’s possible that if you have no acceptable photo ID, a person can vouch for you- but that person must have known you for 2 years, have photo ID , and sign a form in front of a passport agent. A warning on the form states that false statements made knowingly and willingly are ounishable by a fine and/or imprisonment.
This sounds very similar to the procedure we follow in Canada, so maybe I can help with the basics. Basically, you need to know someone in a defined list of professions: doctor, lawyer, clergy, university professor, accountant, veterinarian, pharmacist, etc. You must have known your guarantor, as this person is called, for a certain amount of time–say, two or three years. They certify on your passport application that they have known you personally for _____ years, that they are indeed a _____ [professional] and they can be reached at _____ for verification purposes; and they also sign your passport photos, certifying that the image is indeed you. Then you take your passport application, your photos, and proof of citizenship (birth certificate or naturalization certificate) to the passport office (nowhere else), and they issue you your passport–often after checking to make sure your guarantor is indeed a member of whatever professional body governs that profession.
Like I said, the OP’s scenario seems very similar to what we have to do in Canada, so I hope this helps explain why you’d take your application to a lawyer before you went to the passport office.
Actually, that’s what you used to have to do in Canada. Now, there’s a new guarantor policy that the guarantor doesn’t have to be a professional - they can be any Canadian over 18 that holds a valid Canadian passport. They made this change in late 2007 so that it would be easier to get a passport (since there was increased demand because you now have to have one to travel to the US by air).
I think the OP is wondering though… what happens if Lawyer Dupre has known the person for a long time, but the person has been using a fake name all the while?
Like, what if I was Lawyer Cellphone and my neighbor is Janet Jones. I’ve lived next to Janet for 8 years. She’s taken care of my dog several times while I’ve been on holiday, and in an emergency when she was stuck at work due to a snowstorm, I watched her kids. Janet shows up one day with her passport application and asks me to be her guarantor. “No, problem,” says I.
Then, bam! “Janet” gets arrested. Her real name is Gladys McBaddy. The birth certificate she showed me belongs to some Janet Jones I never met who had her purse stolen 10 years ago by Gladys the pickpocket.
I think the OP is wondering about how much poop the lawyer might be in if the lawyer signed off, in good faith, on documents that turned out to be false.
As Lawyer Cellphone, I signed a document certifying that Glady McBaddy was Janet Jones. But I didn’t know she was Gladys. For the past 8 years, I have believed she was Janet and her fraudulent credentials matched the deception.
When we got our passports (US), we did not need to get any such signature. We did have to present birth certificates and I think one other form of ID (for my husband and me; the kids just needed birth certificates).
I believe that there are some provisions for having someone attest that they know the person, in the event that the person cannot produce a birth certificate… but that’s just a vague memory and I don’t recall the context.
Re the original question: I’m really surprised that it’s any “person of good standing”, on the other hand I would think that if the lawyer in question truly didn’t know the person, he could be at risk of being charged with fraud. Might be different if the lawyer had known the person for some time, and had always known him by the assumed name.
[quote=“Swallowed_My_Cellphone, post:10, topic:462329”]
I think the OP is wondering though… what happens if Lawyer Dupre has known the person for a long time, but the person has been using a fake name all the while?QUOTE]
I think this is what Lawyer Dupe will argue, I notice Lawyer Dupe has already changed HIS name to Dupre during the course of this discussion! Hmmm. 
Another twist is that the birth cert used is that of a dead person. I’m just wondering what defence Lawyer Dupe might use since he professes no wrong-doing - but isn’t the onus on him to be sure - can he blame the passport office.
Thanks for the description of the US method - we might see that used here soon I guess.
Probably not the right forum. You’re not looking for someone’s personal taste, but an objective legal fact (as objective as legal facts can be, of course). I think General Questions is the right forum for that. You can ask a moderator to move it for you.
And welcome to the Dope!
And legal facts depend on jurisdiction. Since the question is about passports, it’s about national laws, and not state or local laws, but as shown by earlier responses, national laws vary by nation. But I agree that this is a GQ question, for all that.
Well, IMHO the onus is more on the passport office. The government should have a person’s birth certificate and death certificate on record, private citizens do not.
Plus, here is an image of a UK death certificate. There’s nothing there to link it to a birth certificate. How is Lawyer Dupe supposed to research whether or not Robert Roe may or may not be registered as “dead” somewhere in the world?
The lawyer was presented with a genuine, government-issued birth certificate (albeit one that was stolen from a dead person) and was acting in good faith based on the documents presented to him, his defense seems pretty reasonable.
A guarantor’s responsibility is to verify that you are who you say you are and that your statements are accurate. “Robert Roe” presented him with official documentation to prove his identity. “Robert Roe” may also have had other ID that he fraudulently acquired with the same birth certificate, and the lawyer may have known him for years under that false identity.
Short of witnessing the guy’s birth, there’s not much “more sure” the lawyer could be. To the very best of his knowledge, based on the evidence presented to him, the lawyer reasonably believed John Doe was Robert Roe. Unless he was procedurally negligent (Eg/ he did not know the applicant for two years or more) his defense is reasonable.
Consider this: Say I had to testify under oath that my father is my father. “Yes, you Honor. That man is my biological dad.” And then later I find out that actually I was adopted, but my family kept the truth hidden from me all these years and amended my birth certificate*, so my birth certificate corroborates the lie. Should I be charged with purjory because I honestly believed, based on the legal documents presented to me, my dad was my biological father?
ETA: I expect I could be charged with lying under oath, but would likely be acquitted because there was no intent to deceive the court, and I was testifying based on the best of my knowledge.
*I have a cousin whose birth certificate was amended so his mom’s second husband appears to be his bio-dad. I don’t know if my cousin knows this or not.
Thanks Giles & Quercus - it seems obvious now that it’s a general question. Thank you for the welcome Quercus!
Cellphone - as you so clearly explain it does indeed seem to be an “acting in good faith” issue.
