If you are a legal permanent resident living in California, a legal problem can ruin your immigration status. This can happen whether the charges are ultimately dismissed or you are convicted. Thus, you should be concerned about your status every time you are arrested or face a legal issue. An arrest can ruin your chances of becoming a U.S. citizen and result in deportation. However, the impact may be less if the charges are dropped.
It is advisable to consult a skilled immigration attorney if you are arrested and the police or a judge dismisses your charges. They will ensure you understand how that affects your status and whether you can become a naturalized citizen. Your attorney can also help you disclose and address the arrest to reduce its impact on your future immigration applications.
The Need for U.S. Citizenship Applicants to Demonstrate Excellent Moral Character
Anyone applying to be naturalized as a citizen of the United States must demonstrate excellent moral character for their application to be considered. This goes beyond demonstrating that you are not a criminal, or a serious one, for that matter. You must show that you have good moral behavior and have been compliant for at least five years, or three years if you are married to a citizen. This is a critical requirement before filing and filing Form N-400. The evaluation of this requirement is conducted solely through a holistic review, which goes beyond analyzing your criminal history.
During this review, USCIS considers evidence of positive community contributions, including tax payments, employment, and civic involvement, rather than just a clean criminal record.
Any indication of a problem with your life, especially if it is not balanced by positive circumstances, like a stable home life, a steady employment record, or a history of participating in volunteer or community work, can undermine your good moral character. Sadly, USCIS does not have a precise definition of ‘good moral character’. Thus, the final decision largely depends on the officer conducting your interview at the USCIS office. However, these officers place greater emphasis on general moral character when determining your eligibility for naturalization.
Specifically, they consider the following:
The Results of a Holistic Review
USCIS conducts a holistic review of your character, encompassing the totality of your life and the circumstances surrounding it. During this review, the officers consider whether you are involved in your local community, how you handle family responsibilities, and your occupational history, rather than concentrating on your criminal history.
Your Positive Contributions
The officers will also consider the good or positive contributions you have been making to your local community. These include whether you are tax compliant, if you pay child support as required, and whether you engage in community-based volunteer work.
The Results of Your Reassessed Conduct
Under this assessment, the USCIS will consider various factors, including the number of DUI convictions on your record, if you have frequent traffic violations, your unpaid debts, and if you have a history of harassing people physically or online. All these can negatively affect your application.
The Results of a Proactive Investigation
These are obtained from proactive background checks and deeper investigations to understand how you relate with your family members, colleagues, neighbors, and other members of society. Officers may speak to people in your life to verify your reputation and understand who you generally are.
The kind of evidence that supports your good moral character for the purposes of qualifying for naturalization includes:
-
Community involvement
-
Financial stability
-
Employment stability
-
Family responsibility
Remember that USCIS will consider your moral character based on the five years before filing a N-400 form for naturalization application(or three years if married to a citizen). Thus, if you are close to the time you were arrested, it could be better to wait for a while before filing your application. Your skilled immigration attorney will help you determine the right time to file your application to avoid a denial.
However, if you wait for a prolonged period, USCIS may look beyond the 5- or 3-year period to decide. If an old arrest was serious, it could indicate a lack of good moral character and affect your application.
Crimes that can Affect Your Application Even Without a Conviction
An arrest or conviction in the U.S. will likely affect you more if you are an immigrant. Some crimes, particularly those of moral turpitude, result in deportation or inadmissibility. However, most of these crimes require you to have been convicted of them to affect your immigration status. For example, you cannot be deported because of a mere arrest; a court process must find you guilty of the crime and sentence you for the immigration office to start the removal process.
However, this is not true for all crimes. Even without deportation, some arrests will affect your eligibility for some services as an immigrant, even if you are not convicted. For example, the immigration authorities can deny citizenship if you are suspected of some serious crimes, like prostitution or drug trafficking. Even without sufficient evidence to prove you guilty of the said crimes, the immigration authorities can deny your citizenship application based on an arrest. Other crimes that can affect you this way include being suspected of drug addiction, drug abuse, or being a habitual drunkard.
An arrest and charges for crimes like those, or related offenses, are sufficient grounds for the USCIS to believe that you are not fit enough to be naturalized. An examiner appointed by the USCIS can simply report that you have not demonstrated excellent moral character, which is a critical requirement to become a citizen.
Additionally, if since you were admitted to the United States as a legal resident, you became a drug addict or drug abuser, the USCIS can initiate a removal proceeding against you, which would later result in deportation. In this case, the immigration officers will not wait for a criminal conviction to remove you from the country. Since some of these issues do not come to the attention of the Immigration Department, the information comes to light once you file Form N-400. Thus, the citizenship application is one way in which immigration learns about your deportability.
The investigation conducted after your application reveals information that the immigration authorities do not have about you, your criminal history, and your activities in the country. Thus, applying for citizenship puts you at a greater risk of facing deportation.
Additionally, the risk is present in all arrests, whether they result in a conviction or a dismissal. Even a dismissed case can cause problems for you during your interview with USCIS officers. Remember that this all depends on the nature and facts of the matter.
For example, if after your arrest you plead guilty to a crime but later the court vacates the verdict because you completed a diversion program, immigration does not consider that an actual case dismissal. The fact that you pleaded guilty to the crime means that you are as culpable as the person who was convicted of the same crime. However, you can submit proof that you complied with all court requirements during the diversion program or probation. This could support your good moral character to some extent.
Again, if the dismissal was done on the grounds of merit, the immigration can still consider it a conviction, meaning that it could also affect your citizenship application.
It is always a good idea to talk to an experienced immigration attorney to better understand your situation and the options. If you are charged with a crime, talk to an immigration attorney in addition to a criminal attorney before agreeing to any plea deal or diversion program. The immigration can consider a dismissed case a conviction, even if it appears dismissed in the criminal justice system. The counsel and support of an immigration attorney can help you avoid problems that can affect your immigration status in the future.
The Need to Disclose All Your Arrests
Honesty is a key cornerstone in all immigration applications. Failing to provide truthful and complete information in applications can result in serious personal and legal consequences that can affect your status for a lifetime.
Disclosing all required information demonstrates your acceptable moral character, which is key to qualifying for citizenship. Your citizenship application requires proof of excellent moral character, which you can easily demonstrate by being honest in your application. Being truthful also helps you avoid permanent inadmissibility. If you provide false information or fail to disclose critical information, you can face a permanent ban from entering the country.
Honesty also protects you from immediate rejection. Immigration officers routinely cross-check every piece of information provided against social media and international databases. They also conduct background checks to verify critical information. Any untrue or undisclosed information can result in immediate denial. It could also result in deportation.
Being truthful also helps you maintain credibility. Your immigration history is permanent. A lie on a minor application can affect a major application, even if it happens several years later. Immigration officers always look for consistency in your previous and current applications to determine your eligibility for a current application.
Thus, when filling out Form N-400 to apply for citizenship, it is important to be as truthful as possible. One question that stands out in these applications is whether you have been cited, arrested, or detained by the police, the Armed Forces, or immigration officials for whatever reason. Even if an arrest happened so many years ago, it is important to disclose it at that moment.
Another question you should carefully answer is if you have ever been involved in a crime, whether as a perpetrator, an attempted perpetrator, or an accomplice. You are expected to provide the accurate answer, even if the arrest was not because you were the perpetrator. The application can also ask if you have ever faced criminal charges for committing, attempting, or aiding in the commission of a crime.
By asking such questions, the USCIS’s intention is usually to discover more about your involvement in crime than what is available on your criminal record. Officers want a clear picture of who you are, which is important in determining whether you have the required good moral character. Even if the nature of the question does not spell it out, you are expected to disclose every instance in which you were involved in a crime, including all arrests that did not result in a conviction. This includes criminal charges that were later dismissed for whatever reason.
The application also asks if a law enforcement officer has ever cited you. This means you should disclose all moving violations or traffic tickets you have ever received. Although some of these minor violations do not significantly affect your immigration status or do not substantially affect your excellent moral character, disclosing them is in your best interests. You risk even greater problems if USCIS later finds out that you did not disclose some or all your violations.
Thus, be as truthful as possible when filling out the citizenship application form. Failing to do that puts you at risk of denial or being deprived of your citizenship in the future. If the USCIS later finds out about the dishonesty, it can still take action even after approving your application and granting you citizenship.
Additionally, you will eventually undergo a biometric check before your application is processed. This means that the immigration officers will eventually discover the truth. The information you are trying to hide, even if it is not in your criminal record, will eventually come out and can affect your application.
Note: Your application is not only affected by your dishonesty, but also by the number of prior crime-related incidents that you cannot remember. Not recalling an arrest or conviction is not a good excuse for failing to disclose it. The immigration office will also consider any incidents in which you did not provide full or accurate information. It will not matter if you did not intend to lie or mislead the immigration officers. USCIS officers are expected to be watchful at all times. If what you provide in the application does not match the facts, you risk receiving negative feedback from your application.
How an Immigration Attorney Can Help
Immigration matters are complex and difficult to navigate without legal help. Immigration attorneys have all the information you need to make informed decisions that will protect you from legal problems that could eventually affect your immigration status. In this case, an immigration attorney can help in several ways, including the following:
Securing Critical Documents
Your attorney will ensure that you have all the official and certified court documents that prove that your charges were dropped or the prosecutor dismissed your charges before a trial. The documents will provide the reason for the dismissal. If the reason proves that you were not culpable of the charges, the dismissal will not affect your application.
Managing Your Interview
An attorney can manage all your interviews with USCIS officers to ensure you answer correctly and accurately, reducing the risk of a denial. They will prepare you in advance to provide the most appropriate explanation for all arrests and charges on your record. The prior preparation also prevents you from making fraudulent representations of facts, especially if you did not report a prior arrest properly.
Ensuring You Minimize Mistakes
An attorney will help you prepare thoroughly before filing for citizenship. They will ensure you include all required information, including any arrests you may not have quickly remembered or did not think were important. They will also ensure you disclose all convictions, even those that were expunged, because they are also important for your application.
An attorney helps you avoid mistakes that could result in a denied application. They will explain the importance of being as truthful as possible, and will review your application before filing.
Preventing the Risk of Deportation
Remember that some of the information you provide in your N-400 application can put you at risk of deportation. Your attorney will prepare for that eventuality in advance to reduce the risk. They will explain the risk to you and prepare to fight the deportation if it eventually comes up.
Find a Competent Immigration Attorney Near Me
A criminal arrest, whether for a minor or major crime, can affect your U.S citizenship application, even if it does not result in a conviction. USCIS requires all applicants to disclose all arrests, citations, and traffic violations, even those that do not substantially affect their eligibility for naturalization. Your honesty in the application and criminal background are critical in determining whether you are a person of good moral character.
At California Immigration Attorney, we take all USCIS requirements seriously. We ensure that our clients in California are fully compliant to avoid mistakes that could ruin their chances of becoming citizens. We can cross-check your application and prepare you well to increase your chances of success. Call us at 424-789-8809 to learn more about this and our services.