How Criminal Charges Can Affect Your Immigration Status
A criminal charge, and especially a conviction, can put your immigration status at risk, from a denied green card to removal, sometimes even for offenses that appear to be minor. Tanner Law Offices works at the crossroads of criminal and immigration law to assist our clients.
How Do Criminal Charges Impact Immigration?
Immigration law treats a criminal record as a separate matter from the punishment a judge hands down. You can serve your sentence, pay your fine, and still face consequences that reach your right to stay in the country. A single charge can have many unintended consequences including, but not limited to:
- Denial or loss of a green card
- Removal proceedings and possible deportation
- Being barred from re-entering the U.S after traveling abroad
- A blocked path to future citizenship
The immigration consequences depend on the offense, your current immigration status, and how the criminal case is ultimately resolved. Even a plea that avoids jail can still affect your immigration case, often in ways people do not expect.
Immigration law defines a conviction more broadly than many state laws. As a result, some deferred dispositions or withheld judgments that seem favorable in criminal court may still qualify as convictions for immigration purposes, making the specific terms of a plea especially important.
Crimes That Put Your Status at Risk
Federal law spells out which convictions can make a non-citizen deportable, and the criminal grounds of removal at 8 U.S.C. Section 1227 cover a wide field. Some categories draw the most attention because they so often lead to removal:
- Crimes of moral turpitude, such as fraud or theft
- Aggravated felonies, as immigration law defines them
- Most drug offenses beyond a small amount of marijuana
- Firearm crimes and many domestic violence offenses
In immigration law, the term aggravated felony covers far more offenses than its name suggests. Some crimes classified as misdemeanors under state law, or convictions that result in no jail time, can still qualify as aggravated felonies for immigration purposes and may lead to removal.
None of this spares longtime green card holders. Lawful permanent residents can lose their status over a wrongful conviction.
What Rights Do You Have in the Process?
Even when both the criminal and immigration systems are involved, you still have important legal rights. You have the right to remain silent, consult with an attorney before answering questions, and, in most removal proceedings, present your case before an immigration judge. Before entering a plea, you should also be advised of the potential immigration consequences of a conviction.
Where this plays out matters as well; a charge in Camp Hill runs through the Cumberland County Court of Common Pleas in Carlisle. At the same time, any removal case moves to federal immigration court, so decisions in one forum can echo in the other.
Protect Your Future With Tanner Law Offices
A criminal case with immigration on the line puts your home, your work, and your family at risk. Tanner Law Offices works alongside criminal defense attorneys to weigh how a plea would affect your status and to discuss outcomes that provide the best option to keep you in the United States.
Call (717) 731-8114 or schedule a consultation online, and our attorneys will help you work through your individual circumstances.