Gathering evidence for I-130 — should I include ALL of our FB messages? There are over 1K pages!

[Bearr 0]

Hi there,

 

We are trying to gather evidence to prove our marriage is bona fide. My husband is Canadian, living in Canada still—I am a US citizen, living in the US.

Because we have never lived together, we do not have many of the suggested items (no joint lease, very little co-mingling of finances, no children...), and are relying heavily on other forms of proof such as photos together, tickets from visits or events we attended together.
EDIT: I also made sure he's my primary beneficiary on life insurance and retirement accounts, and added him to my health insurance policy.

 

We do not have access to any logs of our chat messages from when we first started talking to each other in 2007, but I do have a lot of messages from Facebook (which was our primary method of communication for quite some time). However, when I went to download and export our thread, I realized it is ~1,500 pages. My question is whether I really ought to include all of these in our packet? Or should I maybe take a page or two from each of the years I have logs for?

 

Just trying to avoid a nightmare printing an assembling that monster if it's not even recommended...

Edited July 2, 2019 by Bearr

[SalishSea 17,835]

7 minutes ago, Bearr said:

Hi there,

 

We are trying to gather evidence to prove our marriage is bona fide. My husband is Canadian, living in Canada still—I am a US citizen, living in the US.

Because we have never lived together, we do not have many of the suggested items (no joint lease, very little co-mingling of finances, no children...), and are relying heavily on other forms of proof such as photos together, tickets from visits or events we attended together.
EDIT: I also made sure he's my primary beneficiary on life insurance and retirement accounts, and added him to my health insurance policy.

 

We do not have access to any logs of our chat messages from when we first started talking to each other in 2007, but I do have a lot of messages from Facebook (which was our primary method of communication for quite some time). However, when I went to download and export our thread, I realized it is ~1,500 pages. My question is whether I really ought to include all of these in our packet? Or should I maybe take a page or two from each of the years I have logs for?

 

Just trying to avoid a nightmare printing an assembling that monster if it's not even recommended...

Time spent together is the best evidence of a bonafide marriage.  Please do not send 1500 pages of chats.  It is not required or recommended, and we have even seen cases here be delayed/denied due to what was revealed in the chats.

[suss6052 32]

No, it is definitely not recommended to send 1500 pages of facebook chat logs. Maybe a sampling of messages over time, no more than a hand full per month to show on going communication, but what matters at the outset is evidence to support a bonafide relationship like pictures together in multiple times and settings, vs just chat logs or other tertiary evidence. 1500 pages is just going to delay the adjudication of yours and several other cases besides.

[Crazy Cat 41,886]

At this stage, the strongest evidence you can provide is that of time spent together, continued communications, and your marriage certificate.  But you don't need all 1500 pages of messages.  I would include a conversation every week or so over the course of your marriage.......at least, that's what we did......

[Bearr 0]

Thank you all for your replies, they come as a huge relief!

 

On a somewhat related note, I originally just gathered a handful that showed us together over the years with labels as to the date and setting for each photo. I only have about 20 total at the moment, having tried to limit to 1 or 2 from each year since we started dating in 2010. Is this too few, or an appropriate number?

[NikLR 13,227]

More than I sent and actually more than I have of hubs and I together besides wedding photos! Lmao!

 

Canada is low fraud and really easy going with evidence.  One or two photos a year is more than fine. If they can include some family or friends too, even better. 

Dont bother with chat logs.  The photos with the other evidence is fine. 

[Bearr 0]

19 minutes ago, NikLR said:

More than I sent and actually more than I have of hubs and I together besides wedding photos! Lmao!

 

Canada is low fraud and really easy going with evidence.  One or two photos a year is more than fine. If they can include some family or friends too, even better. 

Dont bother with chat logs.  The photos with the other evidence is fine. 

 

Oh good, even more of a relief. Thank you!

 

We've been together for nearly a decade and are more than ready to be able to live under one roof at last. Naturally, we're pretty eager to mitigate any unnecessary delay to the best of our ability. 🙃

[Nitas_man 3,100]

5 hours ago, Bearr said:

Thank you all for your replies, they come as a huge relief!

 

On a somewhat related note, I originally just gathered a handful that showed us together over the years with labels as to the date and setting for each photo. I only have about 20 total at the moment, having tried to limit to 1 or 2 from each year since we started dating in 2010. Is this too few, or an appropriate number?

I wouldn’t send chat logs

 

Time together (trip records, border crossing records),  financial / asset co-mingling (rare for couples who live in different countries),  + all the mandatory documents that are supposed to be included in the petition seem to carry stronger weight than chat logs and photos. 

 

A short summarized timeline of tactically arranged photos would probably get read

[Bearr 0]

17 hours ago, Nitas_man said:

I wouldn’t send chat logs

 

Time together (trip records, border crossing records),  financial / asset co-mingling (rare for couples who live in different countries),  + all the mandatory documents that are supposed to be included in the petition seem to carry stronger weight than chat logs and photos. 

 

A short summarized timeline of tactically arranged photos would probably get read

Thanks for your reply! Most of our travelling together has been by car since we live fairly close to each other. However, we do cross the border by land almost weekly—do you know if there's an easy way to obtain record of that? The only way I can find is a FOIA request, which the estimation says will take at least 37 days for a "simple" request. I would rather not wait that long to submit if this will not significantly increase the chances of success for our application's acceptance.

[Nitas_man 3,100]

1 hour ago, Bearr said:

Thanks for your reply! Most of our travelling together has been by car since we live fairly close to each other. However, we do cross the border by land almost weekly—do you know if there's an easy way to obtain record of that? The only way I can find is a FOIA request, which the estimation says will take at least 37 days for a "simple" request. I would rather not wait that long to submit if this will not significantly increase the chances of success for our application's acceptance.

hmmm.....I visited my wife Once.  When we got married.  We were fine.

 

They don’t stamp your passport?

 

Try this site

 

https://i94.cbp.dhs.gov

 

https://i94.cbp.dhs.gov/I94/#/history-search

 

Or google US travel history and find that link.

 

For fun I googled Nitas info - it instantly showed every departure/arrival since 2015

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 3, 2019 by Nitas_man

[Bearr 0]

5 minutes ago, Nitas_man said:

hmmm.....I visited my wife Once.  When we got married.  We were fine.

 

They don’t stamp your passport?

 

Try this site

 

https://i94.cbp.dhs.gov

 

https://i94.cbp.dhs.gov/I94/#/history-search

 

Or google US travel history and find that link.

 

For fun I googled Nitas info - it instantly showed every departure/arrival since 2015

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No, I'm afraid they do not stamp passports for land crossing between US and Canada!

 

 

Thank you for the link. Searching for my own info did not turn anything up, but I will try my husband's once he is done with work. Thanks again for your help and support. 🙂

[Nitas_man 3,100]

36 minutes ago, Bearr said:

No, I'm afraid they do not stamp passports for land crossing between US and Canada!

 

 

Thank you for the link. Searching for my own info did not turn anything up, but I will try my husband's once he is done with work. Thanks again for your help and support. 🙂

Your info would not be on this site.  His should be.