Bonafide Marriage Questions

[Jack Lee 0]

My wife in Spain (Filipina) has a few of her friends that has seen us together, and also 2 that witnessed our marriage. That is two good affidavits. She seems to think I should get two here from my family, they are and have been aware of our relationship the past 7 years, though they never met. Anyone have example of this ?  Someone said it has to be on government paper ? Notarized ?

I have airline itineraries from 2013 to 2018 that show they are ticketed, but not all are receipts . Will they work ?

[payxibka 10,047]

3 minutes ago, Jack Lee said:

My wife in Spain (Filipina) has a few of her friends that has seen us together, and also 2 that witnessed our marriage. That is two good affidavits. She seems to think I should get two here from my family, they are and have been aware of our relationship the past 7 years, though they never met. Anyone have example of this ?  Someone said it has to be on government paper ? Notarized ?

I have airline itineraries from 2013 to 2018 that show they are ticketed, but not all are receipts . Will they work ?

I hope you aren't relying on affidavits as proof of bonafide relationship.   Affidavits are last resort type of evidence 

[Jack Lee 0]

No is not all, We have marriage certificate, photos.

[geowrian 22,338]

13 minutes ago, Jack Lee said:

No is not all, We have marriage certificate, photos.

A marriage certificate is evidence that you are married. It is not evidence of having a bona fide marriage. Almost anybody can legally marry so long as you can sit mostly still for ~5-10 minutes and pay an officiant.

Photos can be part of the bona fide marriage evidence, but they are still secondary. Scammers can take photos just as well as anybody.

What matters are things like time spent together, regular communication, commingling of finances as available, etc. Things normal married couples do.

Edited April 20, 2019 by geowrian

[Loren Y 2,756]

As already mentioned, affidavits are a secondary evidence, if you have a few already you should be good. Take them to the interview just in case, but they don't carry much weight. Passport stamps and boarding passes are golden. Any undeniable evidence that you have spent time together is great. When my fiancee and I took photos we always tried to get date and time in the background, like in front of a movie theater markee showing dates. You almost want to have copies of the days paper in front of your photos like you were being held ransom. They want undeniable proof.

Edited April 20, 2019 by Loren Y

[geowrian 22,338]

Re: Affidavits. These carry very little to no weight. They're better than nothing, but pretty much anything else is better. They don't need to be notarized either...notarization just verifies the person who signed it, not that anything in it is true. A CO has no way to verify its authenticity or even assess the credibility of those individuals.

[Just Paul 4,595]

You can add her as a beneficiary on an insurance account.  Add her to your will, retirement and checking and credit card accounts.  Do medical powers of attorney.  Do whatever you can like a married couple can do in the US together.  It is much more limited but do what you can.  You are not expected to have every possible type of co mingling.

[pushbrk 13,240]

Concentrate on the evidence of time spent together in person.  Photos, sure, but they are secondary.  Since your time together was in Spain, not the Philippines, the "primary" evidence of time together would be copies of both your passport pages showing you were in the same country at the same time.  Boarding passes are good too, if you have them.  

 

I have a stronger opinion about affidavits.  I say don't use them.  They DO NOT help and DO make you look desperate.  The only time they CAN help if the person can describe how they personally observed your relationship develop over time, before and/or after the marriage itself.  Otherwise, they are just character witnesses that cannot be "cross examined".