Denied... now what?

[lilQueenP 15]

Here's the short version. My fiance was married. They had a baby boy, and the morning of the 2010 Haiti earthquake, his wife and child went out to the doctor's office and didn't return. After a couple of months, he was strongly encouraged to report it as a death, but had a really hard time doing it, so his friends said they'd help him. Since then, he has applied three times for a visitor visa to the U.S. He has a cousin who lives in Miami, whom he's never met, but who has supported him and put him through college and been like a distant mother to him since his parents died when he was a child. He wanted to visit her, but was never given the visa. Each of the times he applied, he was asked if he had a wife and child, and he said yes. No further questions were asked. He still believed they might show up at a refugee camp or in a hospital or somewhere. But he still had the official death certificate. He just couldn't bring himself to saying "yes, but they are dead", because he didn't want to believe it

Over the past couple of years, we started to get to know each other through an online language site (he working on his English, me interested in French and Creole). Shortly after his last interview, he opened up to me about the situation, and through that process, we began to get really close, resulting in our current relationship.

Since then (last spring), I have been to visit him three times (including now). We have numerous photos, daily phone calls, Facebook messages every day, and we video chat almost daily. For the interview, we were asked to get a death transcript from the National Archives, which he had someone get for him (since he works full time and it's difficult to get off work). After a scare when the transcript did not get back to him, he finally received it.

Today at the interview, all went well until they informed us that the death transcript was fake, which was news to both of us. They then asked him why he had said he had a wife and child after the earthquake. We tried to explain that because no bodies had ever been recovered, he simply couldn't bring himself to speaking of them being dead, although he never spoke about them afterward, and even when the Embassy called his job, they confirmed that they had never been aware of any wife or child despite him having worked there for about two years.

The official told us repeatedly, "I am not questioning the legitimacy of your relationship, it's very clear to me that yours is a legitimate relationship." She explained in broken Kreyol that her concern was that if there was a living spouse out there, that would be the issue, which I totally understand. But after some time of them doing research, they denied. She said the case is closed. We were not asked to come back. She strongly discouraged us from trying another K1 visa, and suggested that he get a divorce and then we can marry in Haiti and do a spouse visa. We again explained that it will be impossible to attain a divorce when there is no wife (as far as we know). She then said (with signs of disbelief) that we could then get a legitimate death certificate (which turns out to be fake as well), and then have the civil union and start over.

When we got the sheet with the reason, it had the first option marked which stated that it's not allowed for someone to marry in order to obtain a greencard. Huh? Didn't she just tell us MULTIPLE times that the legitimacy of our relationship was not the question?

So what do we do? Our options are:

1. Call the DOS and try to get someone to hear how unconsistent this is, and see if we can get a second consideration.

2. Call my senator and see if they can do something

3. Do a petition? I hear this is a bad idea.

4. Get married in Haiti like she said and start over.

5. Get a lawyer.

6. I move to Haiti, which is the plan once I finish graduate school anyhow.

7. ????? (hoping to get some ideas from you all)

The problem is now that there is probably a mark of "likely fraud" on my fiance's file, which is going to make ANY visa in the future, nearly impossible I think. So what do we do? Can I fight it?

Please help. This man is my heart. It seems cruel that they can play with people like that.

Oh, and here's the kicker, he's had multiple visas out of Haiti, into Mexico, Pannama, Brazil and Dominican Republic, and always stayed for a short visit as promised, and came back.

[Villanelle 4,121]

No offense, but theres something a little off about your fiances story. He believed his wife and child were deceased, yet continuously said yes on his visa applications. (claiming it was an emotional issue, even though he had a death certificate) Then when it came time to obtain the transcript, he had to have someone else obtain it for him, because he couldnt get off work... The death certificate he also had then turns out to be fake as well.

So now you have a fiance in possession of a two fake death certificates and two fake transcripts and there is NO sign of the wife or the child. He is claiming complete ignorance as to how these fake documents came about into his possession and youre posting how do I secure a future with this man??

[lilQueenP 15]

No offense, but theres something a little off about your fiances story. He believed his wife and child were deceased, yet continuously said yes on his visa applications. (claiming it was an emotional issue, even though he had a death certificate) Then when it came time to obtain the transcript, he had to have someone else obtain it for him, because he couldnt get off work... The death certificate he also had then turns out to be fake as well.

So now you have a fiance in possession of a two fake death certificates and two fake transcripts and there is NO sign of the wife or the child. He is claiming complete ignorance as to how these fake documents came about into his possession and youre posting how do I secure a future with this man??

You are clueless about Haiti and about the earthquake. I did not post this to get Judge Judy-esque advice, but to get real help.

He did not believe (or want to) that his wife and child were deceased, his family members insisted that he file the report when they weren't found. And they did it for him, which is often the case in Haiti.

Not one of the officials were surprised at the numerous fake documents presented while we were there. It is difficult to get the official ones, and people work very hard to appear as officials to get your money. That is part of the culture here.

He does not have two death certificates. The baby was a newborn and did not have a birth certificate yet. That is how it works in Haiti where most babies are still delivered at home.

He is not claiming complete ignorance. He knows where he got them... from the friends/family members who did his bidding. That is the way in Haiti. There are many unemployed who are happy to do what they can for a couple of Haitian dollars. He has his cousin deliver lunch to me, and that regularily gets messed up... it's part of being in Haiti.

Do yourself a favor. Read something about Haiti and about the earthquake. Find out how people mourn when there is not a body found, and then reevaluate how idiotic your assessment sounds.

Have a nice day.

I welcome feedback on the questions that I originally posted.

[mtcmk1 37]

You are clueless about Haiti and about the earthquake. I did not post this to get Judge Judy-esque advice, but to get real help.

He did not believe (or want to) that his wife and child were deceased, his family members insisted that he file the report when they weren't found. And they did it for him, which is often the case in Haiti.

Not one of the officials were surprised at the numerous fake documents presented while we were there. It is difficult to get the official ones, and people work very hard to appear as officials to get your money. That is part of the culture here.

He does not have two death certificates. The baby was a newborn and did not have a birth certificate yet. That is how it works in Haiti where most babies are still delivered at home.

He is not claiming complete ignorance. He knows where he got them... from the friends/family members who did his bidding. That is the way in Haiti. There are many unemployed who are happy to do what they can for a couple of Haitian dollars. He has his cousin deliver lunch to me, and that regularily gets messed up... it's part of being in Haiti.

Do yourself a favor. Read something about Haiti and about the earthquake. Find out how people mourn when there is not a body found, and then reevaluate how idiotic your assessment sounds.

Have a nice day.

I welcome feedback on the questions that I originally posted.

I think the best thing to do is to follow the official's advice and get married in Haiti and then file for him as your spouse. This will be the best option, I think. I don't think appealing will change anything since the decision is final. And since she suggested you go that route, I don't think it'll be impossible for him to get a spousal visa/adjustment of status.

I just want to also clarify something: the BEST way to get the real papers in Haiti is to go to the National Archives yourself. Do not send anyone or pay anyone on the streets posing as officials (your fiance should know that...) There are organized and official ways of doing things there, you just have to do it yourself and take days off work and go to the correct offices. Most babies are delivered in hospitals now too and birth certificates do not take long to register. Death certificates are even easier to get (believe me.)

I hope everything works out well for your next journey. I am praying for you since I know you mean a lot for each other. Just make sure for the next round, he does get real death certificates--so that you can register your marriage in Haiti and file for the spousal visa. Good luck!

Edited January 18, 2013 by mtcmk1

[NigeriaorBust 4,087]

Right now you have gone to an interview and presented fake documents as part of an effort to get a visa ( I don't mean this in a bad way just facts ) They seem like they understood and may not have hit you with a material misrepresentation. If you push at getting it reviewed you might not be so lucky with someone else or in trying to force them to justify why you were disapproved. I would walk quickly away from that whole package.

You need something that officially terminates his old marriage. That would either be a real death certificate or dovorce papers. There is probably some way to "serve" divorce papers to someone who can't be found , in the US it is usually done by posting notice in a newpaper. Do this BEFORE you marry. Otherwise you could land in dodo for polygamy and you don't want to risk a fraud marker if they were nice and didn't apply one this time. Before taking any papers to the embassy again pay to have someone official look at them and make sure they are real. You are already on thin ice.

[Villanelle 4,121]

I am truly sorry if you found my post offensive. I could only respond to what you posted.

No where in your first post did you mention anything about anyone at the consulate being 'not surprised at the numerous fake documents presented while we were there.' in fact you said something to effect of the woman looking at you in disbelief.

And now youre adding another confusion and somewhat more complicated layer to this- the child does not have birth certificate either.

I do agree with the above poster though, if fake documents are heavily present there (another element you left out in your original post) its your fiances responsibility to ensure he is not victim to it. Yes, its a difficult thing to do in a time of mourning, but thats how it is.

So again my comments were based on your original post.

What do you do now? Well, for US immigration purposes he is still married. He either needs proof of a divorce or a death certificate for his wife.

The reason she checked off 'marrying someone to obtain a GC is not allowed' as the reason for denial was because she was doing you a favor. DO NOT APPEAL THE DECISION. If she checked off that you are denied because you submitted phony documents to USCIS, you would be in serious trouble. So leave it alone. Do not send a letter saying we were denied on the basis of our relationship not being valid when it should have been because our docs were phony but now we have real docs, please approve us. Submitting phony docs can cause a permanent visa ban as it is fraud.

Submitting another K1 will cause your first K1 to be looked at again and the discrepancy in documents may be discovered (what you previously submitted vs what you have, the fake vs the real) and the next agent may not be so kind as to over look it as she did.

So go the spousal route if you want to bring your fiance to the US.

[lilQueenP 15]

I am truly sorry if you found my post offensive. I could only respond to what you posted.

No where in your first post did you mention anything about anyone at the consulate being 'not surprised at the numerous fake documents presented while we were there.' in fact you said something to effect of the woman looking at you in disbelief.

And now youre adding another confusion and somewhat more complicated layer to this- the child does not have birth certificate either.

I do agree with the above poster though, if fake documents are heavily present there (another element you left out in your original post) its your fiances responsibility to ensure he is not victim to it. Yes, its a difficult thing to do in a time of mourning, but thats how it is.

So again my comments were based on your original post.

What do you do now? Well, for US immigration purposes he is still married. He either needs proof of a divorce or a death certificate for his wife.

The reason she checked off 'marrying someone to obtain a GC is not allowed' as the reason for denial was because she was doing you a favor. DO NOT APPEAL THE DECISION. If she checked off that you are denied because you submitted phony documents to USCIS, you would be in serious trouble. So leave it alone. Do not send a letter saying we were denied on the basis of our relationship not being valid when it should have been because our docs were phony but now we have real docs, please approve us. Submitting phony docs can cause a permanent visa ban as it is fraud.

Submitting another K1 will cause your first K1 to be looked at again and the discrepancy in documents may be discovered (what you previously submitted vs what you have, the fake vs the real) and the next agent may not be so kind as to over look it as she did.

So go the spousal route if you want to bring your fiance to the US.

This is actually somewhat useful. If the first post had been such, it would have been much more productive.

There was no question about a death OR birth certificate for the baby.

As I stated multiple times, there was no surprise that the documents were fake, and multiple others had the same issue. There was no accusation on that part, and they let all the others go through. That was not the issue.

[Asia 2,491]

The official told us repeatedly, "I am not questioning the legitimacy of your relationship, it's very clear to me that yours is a legitimate relationship." She explained in broken Kreyol that her concern was that if there was a living spouse out there, that would be the issue, which I totally understand. But after some time of them doing research, they denied. She said the case is closed. We were not asked to come back. She strongly discouraged us from trying another K1 visa, and suggested that he get a divorce and then we can marry in Haiti and do a spouse visa. We again explained that it will be impossible to attain a divorce when there is no wife (as far as we know). She then said (with signs of disbelief) that we could then get a legitimate death certificate (which turns out to be fake as well), and then have the civil union and start over.

When we got the sheet with the reason, it had the first option marked which stated that it's not allowed for someone to marry in order to obtain a greencard. Huh? Didn't she just tell us MULTIPLE times that the legitimacy of our relationship was not the question?

IMHO you were denied, because (since you showed some fake documents) your fiance isn't free to marry, so it seemed to the CO that him getting married is only for obtaining a green card.

She didn't questioned your relationship per se. She questioned his martial status. Which - according to what you wrote - isn't single/widowed/divorced, and only one of those three would let him to get married.

I'm sure there is some official way to get the legal death certificate or a divorce decree. And I'm sure that as soon as you obtain those documents, you can apply for a visa (since he will be free to marry - which is a requirement for a K-1 visa).

Tho I'm sure I'll be corrected if I'm wrong.

Edited January 18, 2013 by Asia

[Villanelle 4,121]

The K1 process is different from the Spousal CR1 process. There are guides on this site that will be helpful to you.

When applying for the K1, if the immigrant has children, unless you are applying for visas for them as well, (k2s) USCIS has no interest in seeing birth certificates for them, they only require that you disclose their names on the form.

However for the CR1 form I130, Your husband will be required to show proof of his childs legal birth certificate. Even though he is not applying for a visa for the child. He will also have to show his marriage certificate and proof his wife id deceased or he is divorced. (the childs death certificate is irrelevant to USCIS but as long as he is remedying the spouses death certificate he should tie up all loose ends and remedy the childs as well)

Again, verify that all your documents are legitimate before presenting them to the consulate because if he presents a false document he can be classified as inadmissible, his spousal visa will not be granted nor will he ever be issued a tourist visa again to the US. (You would be able to appeal it, but it would be an incredibly long and costly battle and you would only win if you could prove in court that document fraud is prevalent there and he was an innocent victim to it, and it was not intentional material misrepresentation on his part and the ban is not justified)

So again your choices right now would be

1. Appeal the decision. You were denied because the officer selected she determined your 'marriage intent was to obtain GC'. (again, she did this because if she selected 'no proof of relationship, theres a chance someone would have reviewed the file after her to see if she made the right decision. In doing so, they would have discovered the false documents and categorized your fiance as inadmissible. With the choice she selected her decision is final and no one will review it unless you request them to) So, you can ask for the file to be reopened and examined. They will agree it was not your intent to marry for a GC, but have no choice to declare your fiance inadmissible for false documents. You sadly do not get a second chance to submit legitimate documents. Like I said youd have to appeal it through a long and costly appeal process.

2. Submit a new K1, pay new fews, wait, etc. Also a bad idea. This will cause them to review the original K1. And the above scenario will play out.

3. Marry and file the Cr1. Obtain all the legal documents. Get them verified before presenting them.

4. Simply move to Haiti yourself in the future after grad school and forget about trying to immigrate him to US right now. (if thats something your both comfortable with) The CR1 process takes about 10 months. After that he will have a conditional GC. There are residency requirements when you have a GC. If you both move back to Haiti after its issued he can lose his GC.

[Sarah Elle-Même 660]

Wow sorry this happened to you, and sorry for your fiance's loss. My fiance is from a country where people get married, get divorced, are born and die without ever registering it with any court or ministry. This is of course for cultural reasons (or as my fiance says, because Yemenis don't give a s***), not because of any devastating natural disaster. Regardless, looks like you've found that the US Embassy is not sympathetic to the norms or realities of the country. Indeed they are not. It's also no surprise that they denied your fiance a tourist visa all those times. Even before the earthquake, Haitians didn't have a snowball's chance in hell of getting a tourist visa unless they were super wealthy and connected.

The others have given great advice - go to the National Archives yourself to obtain a legitimate death certificate. I don't think the death/disappearance of his child who didn't have a birth certificate is material here, although it is sad. Then get married there and file a I-130 spouse petition. I don't think hope is lost yet for him to move to the US. Thankfully you had a consular officer with a heart. She really spared you guys by not marking misrepresentation.

Your old application will indeed be reviewed by the time he has his next interview, but at least for a new spouse petition you will have all your ducks in a row with an official death certificate. Best of luck!

[catknit 144]

Right now you have gone to an interview and presented fake documents as part of an effort to get a visa ( I don't mean this in a bad way just facts ) They seem like they understood and may not have hit you with a material misrepresentation.

I completely concur with this - hitting you with a misrep, which she [CO] could have done in a heartbeat with fake documents, would just have made your case harder. Instead, it appears she opted to go with a more surmountable "this may be a relationship of convenience" which I'm sure still hurts to hear. But, it should be easier to go forward with this than a material misrep....

One of your comments in your OP is about moving to Haiti after you finish school anyway - what does that time line look like? This should be a part of decision making. If you believe you'd be in Haiti in the next couple of years, maybe pursuing the visa at this time just doesn't make sense. As it stands, you need to start from the beginning as well as deal with a way to fix the issue in Haiti. So, let's say your fiance needs to divorce and it takes 6-8 months, then you marry there [say 1 month more to get the paperwork to start a new petition], then another 8-10 months until the new CR1 interview....you're almost at 2 years right there.

That said, make sure if you do marry [even if you decide to move to Haiti long term] don't set yourself up with more issues. Make sure the divorce or proper death certificates are 100% signed, sealed, delivered...

[Janelle2002 3,865]

Unfortunately, he cannot get a fiance visa because he cannot prove that he is elgible to be married. We understand what you know, but it is still all about proof. The only way he can prove that he is elgible to be married is with death certificates, divorce certs, things of this nature. He need to get a REAL death certificate, or go to court and divorce her as a no show and explain to the judge the situation. It can be done.

I agree with everyone else. PLEASE DO NOT PUSH THE ISSUE!! This CO was really nice not to hit you with misrepresentation and fraud for presenting a fake document. Then you would have to do a waiver 601 which can be lenghty. Even if you all did not know it was fake, it was your duty to make sure that it was real.

Your chances still look good because it appears she believes your situation. All you need to do is fix your situation so that he can be elgible for marriage.

Best of luck!

[Boiler 43,568]

It is certainly not unknown that when applying for Tourist Visa's a spouse/child is claimed to show ties.

This has now come back to bite him.

The simplest solution would be for you to move.

[AmyWrites 593]

You have a very difficult journey ahead of you, I wish you the best of luck. I'd start getting a GOOD lawyer from now on.

[Benediction 15]

I agree with AmyWrites!