|
How to use Documentary Evidence to Corroborate your Claims Under general principle of law, whatever you say, you need to have evidence to support your assertions. You have to bring your witness or provide document to the court for judge and opposing attorney to have opportunity to ask questions for the record. However, it is rare for Citizenship and Immigration Services (CIS) to interrogate any witness for the majority of immigration petitions although CIS often checks the reliability of your documentary evidence, such as association or patent, particularly in this internet world. Therefore, it is crucial that you have to affirmatively provide expert’s statements and documents to support any of your claims. CIS or Administrative Appeals Office (AAO) will not recognize your assertions when you simply make assertions without any supportive evidence. For instance, an Indian petitioner claimed that he is a member of American Chemical Society (ACS) which requires outstanding achievements as membership requirement. The petitioner only submitted membership requirements which require member to have a degree in the field, a number of years of experience and nomination by current members. All the requirements do not specify any outstanding achievement of a new member. Both CIS and AAO denied the immigrant petition. So, if petitioner wants to claim that an association requires a particular achievement in order to admit as member, he or she needs to provide documentation for membership application which clearly restricts membership to outstanding persons. While opinions of experts in the field are not without weigh, they cannot form the cornerstone of a successful claim for the petitioner without further support documentation. Therefore, petitioner’s achievement stated in references without corroborating document, such as prize, independent citations, or reviewing papers, to support assertion will be discounted by CIS. Another example is that one professor claimed that she served as a reviewer at an international conference but submitted no evidence in support of that assertion. Further, she did not list chair experience on her resume. CIS concluded that the record lacked sufficient corroboration of the petitioner’s judging and evidence of the significance of these judging responsibilities. Our advice is that when you are trying to claim one academic experience, you had better to have sufficient and consist documentary evidence to support them. Much worse, you unsupported claims might hurt your creditability in the petition. AAO feels that they are not obligated to accept petitioner’s self serving statements on her resume or any documents in the petition if there is no supporting documentary evidence. Additionally, letters from petitioner’s immediate circle of colleagues, especially for those that fail to identify or explain alleged contributions, are insufficient evidence by themselves. By contrast, citations or letters from independent members of the field who were previously aware of the petitioner’s work are more persuasive than letters from the experts who merely review petitioner’s credentials. Final words to remind readers, you have to possess the necessary qualifications as of the filing date. Any publications, awards, or citations, for instance, coming into existence after the filing date will not be considered by CIS. A petitioner may not make material changes to a petition that has already been filed in an effort to make an apparently deficient petition conform to legal requirements. In practice, CIS or AAO will disregard any evidence happened after the filing date, even at the time of RFE. In conclusion, general attestation of a contribution to a field without more detail is insufficient. Petitioner has to identify a specific contribution and explain how his or her work has influenced the field in plain language. Simply going on record without supporting documentary evidence is not sufficient for purposes of meeting the burden of proof in immigrant proceedings. Our advice is simple: if you don’t have, don’t say it. How to use Documentary Evidence to Corroborate your Claims Some Stringent Comments from CIS Fee Schedule
|
|