‘Marriage Fraud Bar’ Blocks Man’s Effort to Get US Residency

Immigration officials properly rejected a man’s effort to become a permanent US resident through his “likely genuine” second marriage because they deemed his first marriage a sham, a federal appeals court said.

The US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed a lower court decision concluding that the U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services lawfully investigated Czech citizen Robert Mestanek’s two marriages, correctly weighed his first wife’s statement that their marriage had been fraudulent, and properly applied federal law to deny his second wife’s I-130 petition, which US citizens file for family members seeking US residency.

“Adopting the Mestaneks’ position ...