I recently posted a blog about a problem we are having at the Phnom Penh Embassy where the Consular Officer is not content merely to deny the Visa Application, but instead is making a finding of “fraud or material misrepresentation” so as to make it much more difficult for the same applicant to apply in the future. In that blog, I referred to the fact that it is now essential to get USCIS to overrule the embassy’s finding..
Many years ago I had a case, also in Cambodia that involved a finding of “fraud”. My client had married a United States Citizen, and she wanted her husband to sponsor her children as his step-children. For that to happen, the children needed to be under sixteen (16) at the time of the marriage, and five (5) of her six (6) children were over sixteen (16). The oldest was twenty-six (26). With the help of her forms preparer, she filed a petition claiming that the children were all much younger than they were, and came up with records from the children’s school, way out in the countryside, indicating that they were much younger than they really were. When they went in for interview, the Consul made very clear that he did not believe that they were their stated ages and gave them multiple opportunities to recant. They insisted that they were their stated ages. The embassy did a full investigation. They actually took the school records to the school out in the countryside to verify that they were forgeries and rejected all six (6) children on fraud grounds.
The client then hired me to get the youngest child, who was under sixteen (16). He was maybe twelve (12) at the time of the interview. When I met the Consul in Phnom Penh, he sneered that he remembered this case and was very expressive about how much he hated this family and went on and on about what frauds they were and about how much work they had to do to prove it. Whenever he would pause to breath, I would ask about the little boy. After he harangued me for about fifteen (15) minutes, he told me that he saw my point. He said that he did not believe that the little boy said anything and conceded that he would not expect the little boy to speak up when his big brothers are saying something, even if it is not true. He advised me that he was going to refer this file to USCIS for revocation, and that he was going to seek a USCIS investigation of the mother. He actually wanted to revoke her green card. He advised that he was going to wait and see what USCIS did. However, if USCIS did not do anything then he would check his records to make sure that the little boy actually did not say anything. He took the documents and advised me that he absolutely would have the documents verified. He promised that if USCIS did nothing; if the boy said nothing and if the documents were verified, he would give the boy his visa. However, he also told me that even if Hun Sen were to appoint one of the older brothers who did do all of the talking to be Ambassador to the United States that they still would not get a visa, because he was entering into his computer that they had engaged in fraud or material misrepresentation. As we both expected, USCIS never did anything with the files when they were returned to the United States. The little boy did get his visa; is in the United States now, and is actually doing very well. My guess is that I will not be seeing the older brothers in the United States any time soon. USCIS will not reverse the fraud or material misrepresentation finding, so the Embassy’s finding stands.