Poughkeepsie, NY Immigration Law Firms & Lawyers

For citizenship cases, relevant documents to prove physical presence in the US are passports, other travel documents, reentry permits, tax returns, evidence of schooling, past employment, leases with rent receipts, deeds with mortgage statements, banking statements, utility bills, telephone bills, etc. Your having two safety deposit boxes and accessing them weekly is questionable as the bank may not give you your access records. Pledging something in front of a notary every two weeks may help, but a notary's stamp is not an official government document and some notaries have been known to falsely notarize papers of individuals not in front of them.Due to the limitations of the Lawyers.com Forums, Alan Lee, Esq.'s (the "Firm") participation in responding to questions posted herein does not constitute legal advice, nor legal representation of the person or entity posting a question. No Attorney/Client relationship is or shall be construed to be created hereby. The information provided herein by the Firm is general, and requires that the poster obtain specific legal advice from an attorney. The poster shall not rely upon the information provided herein as legal advice nor as the basis for making any decisions of legal consequence.  

The fact that your husband is here illegally will be a problem, but not one that cannot be resolved. He will need a waiver for his unlawful presence in the U.S. and will most likely have to go through consular processing in his home country. I strongly suggest that you contact an experienced immigration attorney for a face-to-face consultation and give him/her all of the facts surrounding your situation. (S)he would then be in a better position to analyze your case, advise you of your options and, if possible, make sure that the necessary paperwork and documentation is properly presented so as not to delay the process.

An adult age 21 or older who has been a Permanent Resident (has had a "Green Card") for more than 5 years generally may be eligible to apply to become a naturalized citizen, regardless of whether she may have become separated from her U.S. citizen husband through which she applied to become a Permanent Resident. It then would not be necessary to supply records of a joint bank account or jointly filed taxes (but it may be necessary to show documentation that you and your husband were living in a bona fide marriage before you became separated). It would be wise for you to consult with an immigration attorney to examine all of the relevant details and advise you about eligibility and to represent you in the application process. That attorney also could address whether your children, who became Permanent Residents before they reached age 18, might qualify to automatically become U.S. citizens without having to go through the naturalization application process (although they would need to file an application for a Certificate of Citizenship if they were eligible and they wanted documentary evidence of their citizenship). Some immigration law firms, including mine, offer legal services on a "flat fee" basis so that a client will know the total expense from the very beginning, and a few immigration law firms, including mine, offer an initial consultation free of charge.