divorced 28 years ago and no records

[MisterT 0]

Hello everyone. I understand I have to list all my previous marriages when filling out I129F and I did list two that were ended in the last 13 years.

But my first marriage was in 1983 (Lake Tahoe) and ended 1985 in Europe. On this one I have no records, whatsoever. Since it is so old, can I just leave that out? Any comments would be appreciated. Thanks.

[MedRoni 161]

Omitting your first marriage is like telling a lie to immigration and is not a good idea at all. They may not know about the divorce in Europe but you are on record here in the US for the marriage. I would recommend getting in touch with the courts over in Europe and try to track down the paperwork. There needs to be record of this somewhere. It may take a lot of hard work and detective skills but I am sure your new fiance is well worth the effort.

[Lynkali 163]

I have to agree ... you need to get this resolved and find some sort of records. European countries are actually pretty good about having centralized databases, so it's probably easier than trying to track down old records in the scattered USA counties which all have different levels of competence. I would think that phoning or writing to the public registrar in whatever country you were divorced would yield fairly fast results.

Also, how did you remarry after that, were you not asked to provide proof of prior divorce then?

No one on this board, or anywhere else, will suggest that you LIE to immigration -- it's cause for serious trouble if you do, and they will find out. It may take extra time and effort, but there must be records available, "Europe" is a pretty organized place. (I will say it might help if you could be more specific about the country -- lots of people here might step in to give advice on who to contact!)

[aaron2020 11,651]

You cannot omit anything from the record since you are signing them under penalties of perjury. You attest that the information in the forms are correct. You would be committing perjury by ommitting the information about your first marriage. THIS IS NOT THE WAY TO GO. IT IS THE WORST THING TO DO WHEN APPLYING FOR AN IMMIGRATION BENEFIT.

Go get the records. You need them. It's your only way of proving that your first marriage ended. YOU ARE REQUIRED TO SHOW YOUR PRIOR MARRIAGGES ENDED ON YOUR IMMIGRATION FORM.

[MisterT 0]

Thanks for the replies.You confirmed what I felt about it. I will spend the time to find the court papers from back then.