Divorce While Waiting for ROC Approval

[michsa 0]

Hi,

I'm going to start by apologizing for the long post. I wanted to try and get everything set out so it was understood. I'm hoping it makes sense, and that someone can take the time to read through it all and give me some great advice, it it's possible

I'm looking for some help, but first here is a rough outline of my process so far :

2011 : Arrived in US and got married to love of my life

2012 : 2 Year GC approved

2014 : May I filed ROC, have received NOA 1 and now received an RFE

End of May he filed for Divorce

August divorce was final

Circumstances surrounding the divorce is SO confusing and so much to say about it, so I won't get into it, except say that I was surprised by it (he changed his mind a lot and the last I knew he still wanted us to be together and move to Florida, well apparently it was all talk as always and the divorce went ahead and was final last month)

I received an RFE asking for the following :

Final Divorce Decree (obvious I need to send that, and I have that now)

Permanent Resident Card - I sent in a copy of this, so am not sure why I'm being asked for this again, but I can resend

Evidence of Good Faith Marriage - I sent in Tax Returns, along with a lot of other evidence, but the letter says neither form illustrates assets shared between us.

It lists a few other items that I could send in for evidence, but most of it I had already submitted with my ROC filing. I however, do not have any joint assets with him, he never wanted joint bank accounts etc. from the beginning, he's anti-banks anyways. The car is in his name, we never thought to put my name on it too - there was never a need for that.

I sent in the following items with my original ROC filing :

1. Copy of front of 2 year GC card (I forgot to send a copy of the back, so that may be why they asking for it again??)

2. Front and Back of my Drivers License. Front of his Drivers License

3. First Apartment Lease (I did only send the front page, so I will be resending the Lease showing all of our signatures - but should I send the WHOLE lease or just the first and last pages, do you think?)

4. 2011 Documents that show both our names and the date and address - cards to each other and from family etc.

5. His 2011 Tax Return (filed "married filing separately")

6. 2011 Vet Bills

7. 2012 Renewal Lease Page

8. 2012 Front Page of Progressive Renters Insurance

9. 2012 Vet Bills

10. 2012 Cable Bills

11. 2012 Vonage BIlls

12. 2012 Adoption of second puppy papers to show both our names and address being the same

13. 2012 Documents that show both our names and the date and address - cards to each other and from family etc.

14. My 2012 Tax Return (filed "married filing separately")

15. 2013 Cable Bills

16. 2013 Vonage Bills

17. 2013 Vet Bills

18. 2013 First page of New Lease for new apartment (again I'll resend with last page showing all signatures - should I send WHOLE lease??)

19. 2013 Documents that show both our names and the date and address - cards to each other and from family etc.

20. 2013 Renewal of Progressive Renters Insurance

21. 2013 Copies of Flights and Itinerary for our trip back home to South Africa

22. Copy of Passport pages with SA stamps on them with dates

23. 2013 Water Bills - started paying more bills in the new place

24. 2014 Gas Bill

25. 2014 Vet Bills

26. 2014 Vonage Bills

27. 2014 Water BIlls

28. 2014 Car Insurance showing both names

29. 2014 Documents that show both our names and date and address - cards to each other and from family etc.

30. I included the Summons for the Divorce

As you can see, we have no assets together - not even bank accounts etc.

At the end of the RFE letter it says to not resend any documents I have already submitted.

What I would like to know is what else can I send them if I do not have those documents (assets together)? I'm completely out of ideas. Should I get letters from family members? If I do, what should they even say? Ideas?

Thanks for your help!!

[Caryh 5,206]

You've gotta add what ever you can. The lack of joint bank accounts, the filing of taxes as married filing separately are hurting you. I would send in the complete lease agreements, not just the cover page. A partial document is like no document at all. Add in photos together, date and explain each. Yes get the affidavits from people who've know you over this time period. They just need to say they've known the two of you over such period of time as a married couple. Send a letter explaining his dislike of banks and aversion to a joint account. Good luck.

[michsa 0]

Caryh - Thank you for your reply!

Yes I forgot to add, I sent in pictures from the time we were together before engagement up until the filing for ROC in May. I dated every single one and had a title on each one explaining what we were doing / where we were!

I knew that the no joint assets and bank accounts would maybe hurt me, but so many people don't have joint things, so I was hoping it would be okay....

[dwheels76 5,477]

Hi,

I'm going to start by apologizing for the long post. I wanted to try and get everything set out so it was understood. I'm hoping it makes sense, and that someone can take the time to read through it all and give me some great advice, it it's possible

I'm looking for some help, but first here is a rough outline of my process so far :

2011 : Arrived in US and got married to love of my life

2012 : 2 Year GC approved

2014 : May I filed ROC, have received NOA 1 and now received an RFE

End of May he filed for Divorce

August divorce was final

Circumstances surrounding the divorce is SO confusing and so much to say about it, so I won't get into it, except say that I was surprised by it (he changed his mind a lot and the last I knew he still wanted us to be together and move to Florida, well apparently it was all talk as always and the divorce went ahead and was final last month)

I received an RFE asking for the following :

Final Divorce Decree (obvious I need to send that, and I have that now)

Permanent Resident Card - I sent in a copy of this, so am not sure why I'm being asked for this again, but I can resend

Evidence of Good Faith Marriage - I sent in Tax Returns, along with a lot of other evidence, but the letter says neither form illustrates assets shared between us.

It lists a few other items that I could send in for evidence, but most of it I had already submitted with my ROC filing. I however, do not have any joint assets with him, he never wanted joint bank accounts etc. from the beginning, he's anti-banks anyways. The car is in his name, we never thought to put my name on it too - there was never a need for that.

I sent in the following items with my original ROC filing :

1. Copy of front of 2 year GC card (I forgot to send a copy of the back, so that may be why they asking for it again??)

2. Front and Back of my Drivers License. Front of his Drivers License

3. First Apartment Lease (I did only send the front page, so I will be resending the Lease showing all of our signatures - but should I send the WHOLE lease or just the first and last pages, do you think?)

4. 2011 Documents that show both our names and the date and address - cards to each other and from family etc.

5. His 2011 Tax Return (filed "married filing separately")

6. 2011 Vet Bills

7. 2012 Renewal Lease Page

8. 2012 Front Page of Progressive Renters Insurance

9. 2012 Vet Bills

10. 2012 Cable Bills

11. 2012 Vonage BIlls

12. 2012 Adoption of second puppy papers to show both our names and address being the same

13. 2012 Documents that show both our names and the date and address - cards to each other and from family etc.

14. My 2012 Tax Return (filed "married filing separately")

15. 2013 Cable Bills

16. 2013 Vonage Bills

17. 2013 Vet Bills

18. 2013 First page of New Lease for new apartment (again I'll resend with last page showing all signatures - should I send WHOLE lease??)

19. 2013 Documents that show both our names and the date and address - cards to each other and from family etc.

20. 2013 Renewal of Progressive Renters Insurance

21. 2013 Copies of Flights and Itinerary for our trip back home to South Africa

22. Copy of Passport pages with SA stamps on them with dates

23. 2013 Water Bills - started paying more bills in the new place

24. 2014 Gas Bill

25. 2014 Vet Bills

26. 2014 Vonage Bills

27. 2014 Water BIlls

28. 2014 Car Insurance showing both names

29. 2014 Documents that show both our names and date and address - cards to each other and from family etc.

30. I included the Summons for the Divorce

As you can see, we have no assets together - not even bank accounts etc.

At the end of the RFE letter it says to not resend any documents I have already submitted.

What I would like to know is what else can I send them if I do not have those documents (assets together)? I'm completely out of ideas. Should I get letters from family members? If I do, what should they even say? Ideas?

Thanks for your help!!

You don't have your 2013 Taxes listed did you guys file that also Married filing separately? That filing for the last 3 years is hurting your co-mingling. You don't have a well documented mingling of a life together.

I don't know what new you can add since they said

You need joint things you bought together. Credit cards Why no bank account?

[michsa 0]

Dwheels76 - thanks for your response!

As stated above he is against banks - he is very old school I'd say, lol

I know it's hurting me now. The Taxes were filed that way because he owns his own business and he said it benefits him to file that way!

[AnotherLostSoul 167]

Married, filing separately is not the thing hurting you. It's purely financial reasons why married couples either file separately, or joint. What would hurt you if you didn't file "married" while you were married. But this is not the case, you filed as married, so in that regard you're fine. Joint bank accounts are very very needed and while I heard a couple people getting approved for ROC without any joint bank accounts ever, I do believe that is a biggie in general. For sure you need the copy of both sides of your GC. They just may want to see the end of your story. :/ Good luck!

You've gotta add what ever you can. The lack of joint bank accounts, the filing of taxes as married filing separately are hurting you. I would send in the complete lease agreements, not just the cover page. A partial document is like no document at all. Add in photos together, date and explain each. Yes get the affidavits from people who've know you over this time period. They just need to say they've known the two of you over such period of time as a married couple. Send a letter explaining his dislike of banks and aversion to a joint account. Good luck.

[Caryh 5,206]

Married, filing separately is not the thing hurting you. It's purely financial reasons why married couples either file separately, or joint. What would hurt you if you didn't file "married" while you were married. But this is not the case, you filed as married, so in that regard you're fine. Joint bank accounts are very very needed and while I heard a couple people getting approved for ROC without any joint bank accounts ever, I do believe that is a biggie in general. For sure you need the copy of both sides of your GC. They just may want to see the end of your story. :/ Good luck!

Married filing separately is also what separated people generally file as. Given the lack of joint bank accounts, this is probably raising the red flags. I think the OP is going to need to really explain why they have no joint accounts. And if she's on good terms with her ex, maybe she can get him to write an affidavit as to why he was against joint accounts, and maybe even why they filed as married but filing separately.

[tuckin14 58]

I have heard that MFS is not a big deal, the important thing is to file as married. It might raise questions; that is, they might ask if you were living together during the period involved. But people do file separately for legitimate reasons.

Likewise, if there is a good - and believable - reason for no joint accounts, it's not fatal. With him owning his own business, it might (?) have been a strategy to shield his individual assets from business creditors.

I don't know if it's possible to do so, but remember that what USCIS wants is proof that you were in the marriage in good faith. If you can show that you would have been happy to co-mingle funds but he didn't want to, that puts you in a much stronger position.

Of course nobody knows just what USCIS decision officers do. We can only speculate based on extremely limited data. Almost no one posting in this forum has a sample size greater than 1 of applications approved or disapproved. But on a purely speculative and subjective basis, if I were an IDO, I'd look at what you have and say "OK, I know you had a marriage license, and I know you lived in the same house, that's pretty good stuff, can you just nudge me over the line to where I feel like you were actually trying to build a future together?" Did either of you have a retirement account naming the other as beneficiary? Any life insurance? On a different tack, did you spend holidays or other family functions with your ex's US-based family? Those might be some other things I'd want to see.

[michsa 0]

I have heard that MFS is not a big deal, the important thing is to file as married. It might raise questions; that is, they might ask if you were living together during the period involved. But people do file separately for legitimate reasons.

Likewise, if there is a good - and believable - reason for no joint accounts, it's not fatal. With him owning his own business, it might (?) have been a strategy to shield his individual assets from business creditors.

I don't know if it's possible to do so, but remember that what USCIS wants is proof that you were in the marriage in good faith. If you can show that you would have been happy to co-mingle funds but he didn't want to, that puts you in a much stronger position.

Of course nobody knows just what USCIS decision officers do. We can only speculate based on extremely limited data. Almost no one posting in this forum has a sample size greater than 1 of applications approved or disapproved. But on a purely speculative and subjective basis, if I were an IDO, I'd look at what you have and say "OK, I know you had a marriage license, and I know you lived in the same house, that's pretty good stuff, can you just nudge me over the line to where I feel like you were actually trying to build a future together?" Did either of you have a retirement account naming the other as beneficiary? Any life insurance? On a different tack, did you spend holidays or other family functions with your ex's US-based family? Those might be some other things I'd want to see.

Tuckin14 - thanks so much for your response!!

Surely the variety of bills and envelopes from cards received, I sent to them showing both our names proves / shows that we lived together?

I'll try and get him to maybe write a letter stating his reasons for the filing taxes MFS, and for the none joint accounts. But if he won't do that, then I don't know what else to do!! I'm not sure how I can show that I wanted to co-mingle funds? I mean all I can do for that is write a letter saying that I wanted to, but he didn't want to because he doesn't like banks, and I wasn't an owner of his business, so my name wasn't on his business account.

I'm trying so hard to think of what that nudge can be, I've sent photos of EVERYTHING we did together and places we went, we even went to visit my family in South Africa last year - of which I sent the photos (of us in CT and with friends, and my Mom even got a professional photo session for all of us, sent those too), tickets, passport stamps etc. to show that. We have no accounts with both our names on, and no life insurance either. He isn't close to his family, so we don't see them often, however, I did send in pictures I have of us both and with his Dad and step Mom when we went away when I first got here. They aren't so into pictures like my family, so I didn't get pictures at every thanksgiving dinner we went to their place

Our cellphones are in my name, but I didn't think that would make any difference if I had to show phone calls to and from each other, because I'm not sure if that would be of any major concern? I mean if it may help I could send in the papers showing calls between our two numbers??

I can get letters from the following people if it may help :

My Mom

Our friend in Cape Town we have pictures with

Our friend here in MI that is an Attorney - we have no pics with him though

My employer has offered to write a letter too

[TBoneTX 46,379]

Did you create wills, medical powers of attorney, or other such documents? These are widely overlooked as evidence of a bona fide marriage, and in fact they're crucial in any marriage.

[michsa 0]

Did you create wills, medical powers of attorney, or other such documents? These are widely overlooked as evidence of a bona fide marriage, and in fact they're crucial in any marriage.

TBoneTX - we have none of those. We have nothing other than bills, renters insurance and our car insurance, with both of our names on them

Edited September 22, 2014 by michsa