Filing a 2nd Petition After 1st Denied

[DebbyNSeyi 15]

Many of you already know that this past Feb., I took my 4th trip to Nigeria in 15 months to have an interview (at my request) with the investigator handling our case in hopes of expediting My fiance's AP. He interviewed me and my fiance separately and we believed that all went well.

One of the questions I was asked was why I had decided to file a K1 visa petition instead of the marriage visa petition; why didn't we just get married? I explained, that initially (back in Feb. '09 when I filed), we thought it would be nice if he met my kids first and my family and friends first as my fiance and then we'd get married.

The embassy denied my fiance's visa because of that reason. They stated that while they do believe that it's a bonafide relationship, my reasoning sounds like I'm not sure and I want my kids approval first and that the purpose of the K1 visa is for people that are sure and committed to getting married and that the 90 day period is just a time period granted to plan the logistics of the wedding.

Since the reason for denial had to do with the fact that they didn't believe my intention was to get married, we want to get married now and file another petition as quickly as possible for a CR-1 visa.

My question is, can we just go ahead and make the plans to do this now, or do we have to wait for the NOIR from the Vermont Service Center? From what I've heard, it can take a very long time to receive that.

If anyone has any knowledge, please advise? Thanks!

[Mrs.Price 0]

This is a very interesting question and I hope the answer is "there's no problem in filing the CR-1 now". I can't see a reason why they denied your petiton. What's wrong in wanting to have your family and friends at the wedding, being part of it, and not just introduce him to everybody as your husband? Sometimes I think they're too neurotic trying to find something wrong in the relationship. My advice is go ahead and get married.

I can say my case is similar. In June last year my (now) husband filed a K1 petition for me, but we were denied because apparently we didn't provide enough proof of a bona fide relationship. That's totally BS. What happened was that by mistake we only sent the USCIS the I-129F; NO G-325A, NO pictures, NOTHING! From what I've read, if the application was incomplete, they would send it back to us so we could complete it and send it to them again, but no, they never assigned us a case #, never sent us e-mails, letters, anything! We called them so many times and were left on hold for a couple of hours, so finally after 3 months an USCIS agent or whatever they're called took our call and told us our case had been denied and that it was "really weird that we never got any response from the USCIS, not even the case #". The funny thing is they took our money, oh yeah, $455 dollars and hopes down the drain. Because of that I spent my pregnancy alone (found out I was pregnant 2 weeks after getting back to Brazil), since I couldn't even get a tourist visa to visit my boyfriend. Of course the consulate would never believe I had intentions to come back to my country. But enough with the drama. =P

My boyfriend came to Brazil in January, we got married and have a beautiful 3 month-old baby girl and we're filing a petition for CR-1 ASAP. He's leaving in 15 days back to the US and I'll just cross my fingers hoping me and the baby will have a snowy Christmas.

Hope everything goes well for everybody who's in the same situation!!

(oh, and sorry by the long post!)

[NigeriaorBust 4,087]

Getting married may not help with Lagos. They are just intent on denying. That being said I have rarely read of a double denial out of Lagos. So if you go through a second petition , making amends for the deficiencies of your first filing if known you are PROBABLY going to get a visa. That being said you can probably be successful on a second K1. What ever you do reference the first visa and cover what you feel they returned it for. Being that you filed on the east coast ( VSC ) there is a possibility that your petition will be reaffirmed when it is reviewed. However if you have gotten married in the mean time that negates any reaffirmation.

[DebbyNSeyi 15]

Getting married may not help with Lagos. They are just intent on denying. That being said I have rarely read of a double denial out of Lagos. So if you go through a second petition , making amends for the deficiencies of your first filing if known you are PROBABLY going to get a visa. That being said you can probably be successful on a second K1. What ever you do reference the first visa and cover what you feel they returned it for. Being that you filed on the east coast ( VSC ) there is a possibility that your petition will be reaffirmed when it is reviewed. However if you have gotten married in the mean time that negates any reaffirmation.

Hi S. -

You're probably right that a double denial for the K1 is unlikely; however, from what I hear, the re-affirming process can take 12-24 months! We don't want to wait that long. The reason they gave for the denial was that they felt that I didn't understand the purpose of the K1; that I wasn't serious and didn't have intent to marry my fiance within the 90 days. By us marrying and filing the CR-1, doesn't that effectively address the reason that they had when they denied us the K1?

[sachinky 465]

I think in your case getting married in this case and filing for a CR-1 is probably the best route.

Your K-1 wasn't denied for lack of bonafide relationship -- it was denied because they felt you didn't fully understand the purpose of a K-1 and therefore, were misusing it. That you weren't fully committed to getting married and your intent to get married would rest on several OTHER contingent factors. If you DO get married, then, well, that removes the cause of the denial.

While it seems unfair to you and your initial reasoning sounds very logical, I can see why the Consulate did what they did. The K-1 is for people who are absolutely ready and committed to getting married, have no other issues to sort out and are going to use the 90 days to plan the wedding. Your answer, while rational, made it seem like you weren't really sure about getting married. You first wanted him to meet your family, kids, get their approval, and depending on that, would decide whether to marry or not. However, no idea why they took THIS long to issue that decision. Should've saved you the heartbreak earlier. You might have been done with a CR-1 in these 8 months.

This is an interesting case and should be referred to ANYTIME makes light of the K-1 and tries to imply that it is okay to use it as a "trial or a test-drive visa."

Sorry about your situation and I do wish you luck in the future!

Edited April 11, 2010 by sachinky