DS-156 Question

[Japple 0]

The help you have all given me so far here is great. Now here comes another....

Box 38 of the ds 156...... the wording in these questions is confusing to me.

If a person was denied a tourist visa, would that constitute a "yes" to the second bulleted question? or is that question only relating to instances of fraud or misrepesentation. (to which she could say no.)

And about the question concerning crimes or offenses.......would that include an infraction for a noise violation from a party? Or is it referring to misdemeanors and felonies?

Hopefully these questions don't sound to dumb, lol. It's just that I would hate to make a mistake on this part. It's so ticky tac.

Thank you thank you thank you for all your help. You guys are awesome.

[rushter 0]

No. Refused admission would mean they showed up at customs and they turned them back.

Refused admission is much different from a denied application to get admission.

Have you ever been refused admission to the U.S., or been the subject of a deportation hearing, or sought to obtain or assist others to obtain a visa, entry into the U.S., or any other U.S. immigration benefit by fraud or willful misrepresentation or other unlawful means? Have you attended a U.S. public elementary school on student ( F ) status or a public secondary school after November 30, 1996 without reimbursing the school?

The 'spirit' of section 38 is in regards to doing something illegal to get into the usa.

I'm not a lawyer and I did not have to use the DOS form for my K1.

If I were doing this process now, I would put the applicable information for a previously denied visa application in section 31 and never give section 38 a second thought; (unless my wife was just a visa hound and stuff in section 38 actually applied to her :-)

Analysis by paralysis in this case does not apply imo.

Regarding crimes and offenses, the wording:

Have you ever been arrested or convicted for any offense or crime,

That would obviously include things as simple as a paid parking ticket.

The issue would be is if it shows up on the applicant's police report(s), blah blah you could talk about this for hours....

Heck fire I'd answer yes... just to give them something to eat and justify their existence.

What you DON'T WANT TO HAPPEN... is if your spouse/fiance goes to an interview with the answered questions being no... they find parking tickets or speeding violations, or... noise ordinance violations, then they consider her a LIAR which can open windows to the unimaginable.

Don't be afraid of the simple stuff. Show all info that's true. It'll give the conoff's something to talk about in the interview.

Just answer yes/no at the correct places and you'll probably be ok. Otherwise, consult an immigration attorney. I did and my app flew thru so fast they almost gave her the visa before the interview.

Consulates love applications that have lots of blue attorney pages in them... it lessen's their work load.

Edited May 22, 2006 by rushter

[Japple 0]

Thank you very much. That gives me a better idea of what to do.

How did you go about getting assistance from an attorney during this phase? Did you use an attorney for the entire process, or only for the last (interview) phase?

Man this can be stressful, hahahah.

[rushter 0]

Man this can be stressful, hahahah.

I waited until the last second, then got my attorney to review everything. The fact that I had a complete package made his job easier and I got a discount... and value added services (lol I don't even know what that means!)...

He redid all the forms (k1), reconstructed the entire package (wow what a job too!), added a few of those attorney representative forms (blue pages that stick out big time)... I did have my wife in her country download that same form, sign several and mail them to me because both parties have to sign it.

k1fianceevisas dot com. May seem like a cheesy plug but that's one of the few things I can tell you from experience is that Alex is good and is very nice to work with too.

Even though it didn't reduce the stress factor that much, it certainly made a tremendous boost in the confidence factor when that final package went out.

[Japple 0]

Thank you very much for the help. Visa Journey is an amazing resource.

Has anyone else had experience with this part of the form? If you have, it would be great to have your input as well. Either way, it looks like I'll need to contact an attorney. =/