Our client left Vietnam to live in the U.S. when he was 14 years old. When he was 19 he was arrested at school, and charged with attempting to sell some ecstasy he had purchased at a rave in the City. He pleaded guilty to a controlled substance offense. Unfortunately, his defense attorney never warned him his guilty plea made him deportable.
Many years later, now in his late twenties,and a college graduatewith a promising career, our client was detained by I.C.E.attempting to return to the U.S. after a weekend trip to Canada. He learned that despite being a legal “permanent” resident, and despite the many years which had passed, his conviction for a controlled substance offense made him inadmissible to, and deportable from, the U.S.. He was placed into deportation proceedings and faced the frightening reality that he could be deported and separated from his family because of his guilty plea.
Our client learned George Terezakis was a litigator with expertise inboth criminal and immigration law,and that he had a reputation for vacating the convictions which made his clients deportable. George was able to keep his client out of I.C.E. custodyduring the deportation proceeding, and was ultimately able to vacate his client’s conviction in less than a year.
After vacating his client’s conviction, in October of 2014, the Immigration Judge dismissed ourclient’s deportation proceedings. We were even able to recover our client’s green card. When he came to pick up his green card from our office, he brought us muffins, thanked us, and told us it was the first time since facing deportation that he could finally relax.