[ad_1]
A retired Kansas Army officer lost his fight in federal court because of his adoptive daughter's citizenship, which means that she may have to return to her home country, South Korea .
Lieutenant-Colonel Patrick Schreiber of Lansing filed a lawsuit after the federal immigration authorities rejected the visa and citizenship applications of his legally adopted daughter, Hyebin, a Korean immigrant niece lawfully brought to the United States. United by Schreiber and his wife in 2012, while she was 15 years old.
Schreiber's service the following year in Afghanistan forced the couple to defer the legal adoption of Hyebin Schreiber until she was 17 years old. An adoption lawyer had stated that, under Kansas law, the deadline to complete the process was Hyebin's 18th birthday.
But under the Immigration Act, children born abroad must be adopted before the age of 16 to obtain citizenship from their American parents.
On Friday, US judge Daniel D. Crabtree, of the Kansas District, pleaded in favor of the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), concluding that "the law on Immigration issue is not ambiguous ".
In an interview with the Kansas City Star in March, the father blamed himself for not having thoroughly studied the rules governing the adoption of immigrants. He and Soo Jin Schreiber have pledged to return with their daughter to South Korea, if necessary, to keep the family intact.
In 2013, Patrick Schreiber was deployed to Afghanistan as the Chief Intelligence Officer, one of six tours of a 27-year military career. He stayed there for most of 2014.
In hindsight, he regretted not to proceed with the adoption until the end of the allotted time. "I should have put my family before the army," he said.
The father's lawsuit was against his years of service in the country, while US immigration officials and an appeal board dismissed several applications for citizenship and visas for Hyebin.
"Lt. Colonel Schreiber is Hyebin's father. No one, not even the agency (USCIS, which refused the family's demands) has ignored this simple fact, "says lawyer Rekha Sharma-Crawford. "Nevertheless, the agency wants this father to agree that the country he loves and that he serves has no place in his laws to protect his family."
The USCIS and its co-defendants, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the US Department of Justice, replied that they respected the minimum age set by the Congress.
While the Hyebin affair was taking place in the judicial system, she retained her residency status by attending the University of Kansas on an F-1 student visa.
Today, she is an elderly person and, according to her parents and Sharma-Crawford, her scientific studies could attract employers willing to sponsor her to obtain a work visa, thus allowing Hyebin to remain at least temporarily in the States. After graduating.
The difficulties experienced by her biological family in South Korea forced the Schreibers – Hyebin's uncle and aunt at the time – to take her with them to Kansas and begin the adoption proceedings. She arrived at the age of 15 years old.
The couple, both of Korean descent, met in 1995, while Patrick Schreiber, an American citizen, was stationed in South Korea. Soo Jin obtained permanent residency status in the United States after their marriage.
The adoption in late 2014 has exceeded the legal requirements of Kansas. The state issued a birth certificate stating that Patrick was Hyebin's father and Soo Jin his mother. As a dependent of a veteran, the girl also received a benefit card from the Department of Defense.
Family members were not immediately available to comment on Friday.
[ad_2]
Source link
