Approval of I-601 Application to Waive Crimes of Moral Turpitude

Our client, Ms. Lee (name changed for confidentiality), came to the U.S. and married her primary school classmate, a U.S. citizen working in Silicon Valley, California as an engineer. Ms. Lee was married before and divorced. She was abused in her first marriage. Ms. Lee was a nurse in her own country working in the high pressure cardiac intensive care unit in a hospital. Her unhappy marriage and high pressure job caused severe depression and hallucination. She took medication every day. On several occasions, she stopped taking medications. She heard a voice telling her to shoplift and kill herself. She ended up twice taking items outside a store without paying for them. She had tried to kill herself but survived. The Court in her country ordered that she received psychotherapy and continued to take medication.

Visiting the U.S., she married her current husband. She applied for permanent residency in the U.S. based on her current marriage. She asked U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) to waive her multiple theft convictions. USCIS denied her application determining the multiple theft crimes made her inadmissible to the U.S. and that her husband would not suffer from extreme hardships if he lived in the U.S. without her or followed to live in her country. Ms. Lee filed an appeal of the denial. After four years from filing the application to the appeal, Ms. Lee received an appeal decision a few days before Christmas of 2016. The Administrative Appeal Office agreed that Ms. Lee deserved empathy and support. They agreed her husband would experience severe emotional, and financial hardship if he lived in the U.S. without her or followed to live in her country but could not find gainful employment there. The appeal decision presented Ms. Lee a very merry Christmas in the U.S.”

View the approval notice by CIS Administrative Appeal Office