Q: I have met a Russian woman through an Internet matching service and want to bring her to the States to marry her as soon as possible. However, there are a couple of complications. I have been separated from my wife for more than a year, but our divorce is not yet final, and I stupidly pleaded guilty to a domestic assault charge that my wife made up because I thought it would speed things along. But now I am afraid that if I tell my Russian lady about the charge, she will get the wrong impression and drop me. Will my fiancee need to know about this assault conviction? And can I proceed with immigration paperwork for her before my divorce is formal?
A: Yes. If your assault is a “domestic violence” conviction, the U.S. consulate will disclose it to your fiancee. The goal of the soliciting and disclosing this information is to ensure that the (unsuspecting) foreign fiancee is not placed at risk of harm. You will be required to disclose under oath information regarding any convic-tions involving domestic violence and other serious crimes (e.g. kidnapping, history of substance abuse).
You cannot proceed with your first application until you have completed your divorce. The law requires that you and your fiancee must be free to marry when-at the time of submitting your first application. You must submit proof of divorce at the time of application.
You should know that these issues you ask about aren’t the only things standing in your way, however. First, the law requires that you and your fiancee have personally met within two years of submitting your first application. This requirement can be waived only if there is evidence that meeting your fiancee in person would violate long-established customs or if it would result in an extreme hardship to you. Waiving the meeting requirement can be difficult to accomplish.
Second, you will be required to disclose that you met through an “international marriage broker,” an entity, regardless of where it is organized, that charges a fee to provide dating services or social referrals between persons in the U.S. and persons outside the U.S.
Finally, undertaking this process is not always quick (or simple). Your application must proceed though several agencies at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. Department of State before your fiancee can be admitted into the U.S. Depending on the U.S. consulate’s workload and how quickly the agencies hear back from you, it could take between nine and 12 months before your fiancee may enter the U.S.
As you see, the process is more complicated than you might have expected, and if you skip steps or fill out the paperwork incorrectly, the process will take much longer. If you lie or omit facts, you can get in trouble with the law. So for a lot of reasons, if you really want to marry your new Russian sweetheart, you would be wise to get the assistance of an immigration attorney.
This column is a service of the Lawyer Referral and Information Service of the Maine State Bar Association. Its contents are a general response to the question and do not constitute legal advice. Questions are welcome. E-mail AAL@mainebar.org, describe your question and note you are a BDN reader. Written questions mailed to “Ask a Lawyer,” Bangor Daily News, P.O. Box 1329, Bangor, Maine, 04402-1329, will be forwarded to the LRIS.