Mr. Terezakis grew up in Commack, New York and went on to attend the State University of New York at Buffalo. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa, Magna Cum Laude, with a B.A. in Political Science in 1982. Thereafter, he attended the University at Buffalo School of Law, from which he graduated, with honors, in 1985, and by which he was awarded the annual “Law Faculty Award.”
Mr. Terezakis’s study of international relations while in college led him to become involved in the Central American human rights movement during the 1980’s and 1990’s. He traveled to Nicaragua and El Salvador with human rights delegations and worked with the Non-governmental Human Rights Commission of El Salvador, in El Salvador, during the fall of 1989.
For more than 35 years, Mr. Terezakis has proudly served as an advocate for members of Long Island’s Hispanic Community and has earned a reputation as a tireless and effective litigator, whose practice is concentrated in the areas of: criminal and deportation defense, family-based immigration, asylum, and the interplay between criminal and immigration law.
Mr. Terezakis is the current Chair of the Immigration Law Committee of the Nassau County Bar Association, and serves as the Co-Chair of the Association of Deportation Defense Attorneys. He was past President of the Nassau County Criminal Courts Bar Association, and has served on the Board of Directors of the N.Y.S. Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, as well as on the Board of Directors of the Immigration Law Section of the Federal Bar Association. He received the Nassau County Criminal Courts Bar Association’s Practitioner of the Year Award in 2013; the Long Island Hispanic Chamber of Commerce’s 2011 Community Advocate of the Year award; and also received an award from the Central American Refugee Center for his pro bono work on behalf of Long Island’s immigrant community.
As a result of his expertise in the field of criminal-immigration law, Mr. Terezakis frequently lectures at continuing legal education programs sponsored by the American Immigration Lawyers Association, the New York State Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the Federal Bar Association, the Nassau and Suffolk Bar Associations, New York County Lawyers Association and the New York City Bar Association. For many years now, Mr. Terezakis has trained members of the criminal defense bar in the critical importance of ascertaining, and reviewing, with their non-citizen clients, the direct immigration consequences of any proposed plea agreement, and on strategies for avoiding deportation. Since 2010, after the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Padilla v. Kentucky, many defense attorneys seek Mr. Terezakis’s guidance to ensure their compliance with their obligation under Padilla.
Mr. Terezakis is fluent in Spanish and frequently travels throughout Latin America.
Reported Decisions
- Dickson v. Ashcroft, 346 F 3d 44 (2d Cir. 2003)
- In re Jurado-Delgado, 24 I&N Dec 29 (BIA 2007)
