Professionals can lose their license to practice their career, when they expose the confidential information provided to by a client. Non-attorneys can extort money from immigrant applicants and have done so without much concern nor interest by our law makers. Ethical attorneys cannot guarantee a decision that must be made by someone else. You have practically no recourse when you complain about a non-attorney. You can actually file a complaint against an attorney where representation is not handled in an ethical manner.
Immigration law is a mix of law and administrative procedure.
Some of those procedures are too complicated to allow for all laws to be followed with precision even by the I.N.S. examiners. The laws evolved based upon unjustified economic fears for job security as well as legitimate concerns for the integrity of the immigration system. The immigration system is attacked procedurally by propaganda as wells as scams. Often, the scams are blown out of proportion by detractors based upon the overall number of applicants. Document fraud has created a system of distrust.