one took eleven years during that time period her husband had a stroke had his leg amputated for diabetes was blind petition they were immediately separated why you might ask well i'll address the elephant in the room there's a fifty three age your age difference between pretty hard almost for those interviews to be done separately actually no your honor in chicago the normal practice is to initially do them together and then if something appears to be problematic they will separate or bring them back for a separate interview at a later date so at least in my twelve years of practicing as immigration attorney that's the normal practice  fifty three years age difference that's i see i'm the reason why we're here today so they are immediately separate without counsel and they were interviewed and during the course of the interview years and they married in one nine hundred ninety five when she was eighteen years old she came to the united states from poland with her parents and lived with her older sisters and this is what she did to support herself along with her sisters when they keep reflecting back on the initial time when he said something about her she got married in europe or her oldest in the united states even though things developed after that so three years after this and beyond resurrecting him we are unable to determine in fact that if that ever happened to be the government has consistently relied on the sworn statement that was took that's why she i was able to see in the united states i'm not certain i understand the question but don't let me i'm not asking that very woman because at some point when someone who's brown eighteen years old and she's going to be ported and you know you're good know well you know she was not she never had any contact with the immigration service at all at the age of eighteen she didn't have contact with the immigration service until they filed the all affirmative application a year after marrying and that was with the immigration service she never had a notice to appear never had any contact with the immigration court until approximately a little less than three years after the she didn't accumulate unlawful presence until the age of eighteen of course she could have left before that i would also point out that she could have to force this man during that he loven period years of time if this was not a real relationship the board of immigration appeals themselves agrees there was a relationship here she cared for him on a daily basis they owned property together she made his medical decisions i mean that there's no dispute that relationship after the fact the question is what the intent was at the time they got manning but intense can be demonstrated by the actions they're after and the evidence otherwise how would you prove intent their intent is they stated a many occasions that they intended to have a marriage but we have submitted hundreds of pages of evidence and the only piece of evidence that the government continues to rely on is this morn statement made by an eighty two year old man  an admission of wrongdoing it's usually pretty silly but where was the wrong doing if you look at the statement all he says is that part of the reason that they got married was for immigration purposes he also saying isn't is pretty meant was that only for his part of the reason well no he says that she said that she was going to be deported which again she'd never had any contact with the immigration service ok but he also says steam statement i never felt she was taking advantage of mean we've made well many times and ome he indicates that she wanted to be married to her so when he withdraws the statement anna asked me to marry her so she wouldn't be deported and so she could get an immigration plan and that's it if i go to my boyfriend and say i'm going to be to pull supported and i want to get married so that i won't be will you marry me and my boyfriend will probably say yes one does not preclude the other and immigration benefits can be a part of the decision making process in a marriage that the decision to marr adjudicated time and time again but that that immigration benefits can be a part of the decision making process the it's not the primary purpose you can't be the only reason you decide to get married but he can be a part of the decision making process so even assuming that this event took place it was ok for that for them to utilize c says that it be sufficient cannot be granted to any only has attempted to enter a marriage to evade the immigration laws and here we have pretty compelling evidence from mrs leaders former husband that that's exactly what happened  as his sworn oral testimony given to the u s c i s interviewer said that he said that he found her crime while she was cleaning his house and she asked him to marry her so that she could avoid removal and then went on to say that they never lived i know he's eighty what was he i believe he was he seventy one when they married he was seventy one at the time that they married so that would have been eleven years ok to a fellow messing through and keep track of how old was he when he made this statement i believe that i make about eighty two of them so that was a lot later it is just reflecting back as opposed to what's going on now it was your honor but if you look at the and dish of reliability of that statement it's a pretty detailed statement he didn't just say she asked me to marry her so that she could remove she said i found her crying and he goes into detail the the whole interchange and then again he goes he signed a statement that says i wish to withdraw my petition for the same reasons and really the only evidence submitted by opponents that would attempt to undermine that pretty compelling mission is this unsigned purported affidavit  long after the fact and that doesn't even directly rebut the substance of the earlier admission he says yes that the i've been taking eyedrops because it might end in cat cataract surgery however that that doesn't speak to the oral testimony that he gave and which again was it was details that he doesn't undermine that account he doesn't say no we got married for a different reason no i love her and this was just a secondary thing he says simply  i couldn't see what i was signing which he doesn't because they're all testimony and i didn't understand the questions but if you read the transcript he pretty clearly understood what was being asked of him based on the answers he gave which is what the agency in the district where both found was the full that would appear to be the agency's practice sometimes i mean sometimes it provides the whole statement what we've got a regulation that says the petitioner shall be permitted to inspect the record proceed which constitutes the you seen in the original statement be in the book for us money from friends and i have seen what was in that produced in the administrative record have you seen the original you still have the aliens you still have the documents yes it's part of the record that actual word of our record it was part of the certified mistreated record it should be in there i can and i can you the problem is though that that you've got the guy reflecting back which is probably correct that is things worked out they were married for all that time and then he had all these disabilities etc etc what happens and and then he dies and she marries again and married to a i think a naturalized citizen  now yes what discretionary ability does the government have to take what is a pretty sympathetic case here they could make an exception but that's not up to us that they could do that right well he wonders there in their discretion could they say this situation the way that's developed use there's a sound marriage now that their marriage was totally my understanding is that you know that the statute is pretty clear and the government's abound they could not that they said yes they they could not look at the the other way and say you know this really is pretty said we've got some other people we harsh statute but congress made that clear and if you look only back to the supreme court's case and look walk it congress intended to give this preferential treatment to immediate relatives of united states citizens particularly  spouses and it is preferential because you can you avoid a lot of the lines that would you have to go through to get a visa and different method but the flipside of that is that the laws very harsh for people who attempt to game the system because it is so easy to to be fraudulent  so do you want to address the eleven year delay we don't have a really good answer to that your honor it's the immigration system is swamped and these however i i don't have information on why this particular case took that long however if you look at the answers that mr kirshner gave they don't seem to be fogged by the passage of time he's he's pretty clear on a lot of details and he in his attempt to recant that original testimony he doesn't say well you know my my memory was flawed he gives other other reasons why that his original test mission not to take into account but there's no there's none of this you know i can't remember exactly which i think if you look at the actual testimony bears that out that that he did member the details i would just like to speak and i see my time is  running low i think to speak very quickly to appellants point that you can have other reasons for getting married or that there can be legitimate feelings in addition to the attempt to evade the immigration laws and that makes it ok this court in the criminal context in the case you know with cruel contacts not directly on point but similar reasoning pointed out that you can get married for several reasons and the fact that there might be feelings that develop where they might intend to live together i first thought i'd like to address the issue of primary purpose i agreed your primary purpose can not be to evade the immigration laws that was not the primary purpose here it could have been one of the purposes based upon the recanted statement that was me and eleven years after the event supposedly occurred but it cannot be primary and we would argue it was never primary that they nursing home home repossessed all kind of business that was lost there was all kinds of issues here and i'd like to address with the questions that you had can the government fix this you can overcome a tool for see finding that's why we're here today how do you become overcome a tool for sea fighting the point is you have to establish a dish no evidence to demonstrate that your marriage bonafide and that you intended to establish a life to gether how much evidence do they have to possess present hundreds of pages have been presented in this case individual on behalf of the corps in the gailey opinion if i may continue or just to point this out that this is a harsh law and one would expect the government in forcing it to make at least modest efforts to guard against mistakes both in terms of providing the evidence fully not redacted not recreated and to properly weigh the evidence that is presented there after this what the government has to do appropriate within the law and the regulations and direct them to evaluate the evidence properly it would be my hope that we would that we would come out ahead in that in that case do you have you things i don't understand what you mean by copies of saumur and recreation well that as well as opposing counsel said the notice of intent to deny took certain portions and gave us that information but i don't believe that we have excerpts of the ten right expert excerpts ok and what about the signed documents i don't believe that that is a part of the record your honor and what about the transcript there is far as i am not even aware if there is a