Hiring or not Hiring a Lawyer:In immigration law (or any area of law for that matter), it is always wise to seek the advice of a lawyer. Immigration law is a vast body of law comprising of rules, exceptions, and exceptions to exceptions. A situation where you end up saying, "Gee, I should have hired a lawyer" is not an enviable position to find oneself. It's always the situation where you think you know just what you are doing that your problems start to pop up one by one. Even if you can't afford a lawyer, you can find a lawyer who will charge you a minimum amount of money for a consultation to see what your rights and obligations are. Parting with $100 for a consultation is a small price to pay to avoid a huge pitfall that could have otherwise been avoided. Keep in mind that a during a consultation may not be possible to get the full scope of the problem you are confronted with - and it should NOT be used as a substitute for actual legal representation. Don't be one of those people who goes to a lawyer for a consultation and then mistakenly thinks he/she is armed with every bit of information to handle the situation themselves. That's why you went to the lawyer in the first place - you are not trained to handle the situation the way that a lawyer is trained to do so. Spending some money on a lawyer may be worth the catastrophic mistake that lawyers steers you away from. "We All Have THAT Friend..." I have seen it time and time again: a potential client in for a consult starts with saying, "My friend told me XYZ..." and it's usually there that the problem starts; his/her friend told them....... Your friend may have been well meaning and was just looking to help you - afterall, that's what friends are for, right? That friend, no matter how well-intentioned, may have gotten second or third hand knowledge which is half-baked, pure speculation, or just flat out wrong. "But It's Just Filling out a Couple of Forms."I hear this all the time, "But it's just a form that needs to be filled out." Yes, that's true. It is a form that needs to be filled out. And those forms were drafted by government attorneys looking to get information on you, your spouse, child, and your family when you are petitioning for a family member or petitioning for a waiver. Each question, each box that needs to be answered and checked off is carefully formulated and there are thousand reasons why they are asking you to disclose that piece of information. It is a lot easier to put in the correct information the first time than it is to go ahead and try to fix something that you have already disclosed. Like I said earlier, even if you can't afford to hire an attorney, parting with $100 consultation fee is a small price to pay if it results in you avoiding digging yourslef into a hole that 1) you may not be able to get out of, or 2) will cost thousands more to fix. When Should I Hire a Lawyer?Almost like Pavlov's dogs, lawyers have been trained to give this universal answer to legal questions presented to them by their clients: "It depends." And the truth of the matter is that as a general rule, it does depend. But, I will take it a step further and say that the landscape of legal problems is not populated with road signs telling you to merge left for legal advice. Legal problems are usually like potholes or screws in the road that flatten your tire or worse. My suggestion to friends and family is that before you take any course of action that involves a legal question, see a lawyer (or see a few lawyers) to get a lay of the land. A lawyer is trained to analyze issues that you are not trained to. To the lay person a situation may not seem to need a lawyer's attention. But, a lawyer who has dealt with that issue day-in-day out knows the anatomy of the problem. If you have an immigration problem, please do not hesitate to contact our office to schedule a confidential one-on-one consultation. M. Ray Arvand, Esq.
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AuthorM. Ray Arvand, Esq. Archives
October 2017
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