Chris' Immigration Nightmare

This web site is in loving memory of my wife Janet Sinback

-----Breaking news-----
orphan adopted at 6 months old by 2 US Citizens deported to San Salvador -
see U.S. adoptee a stranger in his birthplace

----Great news---

Thanks to the help Los Angeles US Attorney Thomas P. O'Brien and
Assistant US Attorney Kevin Finn the USCIS has finally capitulated and granted Christopher his US Citizenship

We are heading to Veracruz to finally be able to inter my wife's ashes

Janet and Christopher interring James Sinback, Christopher adoptive father, ashes
by the Isla de Sacrifios, Veracruz in in 1998

This shameful madness and national disgrace must end

The Child Citizen Act of 2000 needs to be amended to give US Citizenship to foreign born orphans adopted abroad by US Citizens. Adopted orphans like Christopher who were born before February 27, 1983 and fell between the cracks - H. R. 120 must be passed -
How will God judge a country that would deport orphans to a land they never knew?

Citizenship or at least an exemption from being deported needs to be added to the law so that US Citizen parents and their adopted children don't have to fight though the nightmare of countless appeals, fear, threats of deportation and a very uncertain outcome.
see 8 USC Section 1431 Children born outside the United States and residing permanently in the United States; conditions under which citizenship automatically acquired

In 1967 Janet adopted a starving brain damaged orphaned 6 month old Child while she was in Greece with her deceased first husband James Sinback (a Korean War Veteran and a 26 year employee of Lockheed) while he was working for Lockheed on a United States Air Force Contract with the Kingdom of Greece. He was working on tactical nuclear weapons delivery systems, at the height of the cold war, to help defend out nation against the USSR.

The Sinback's had spent 6 years in Europe, first in Turkey, then in Germany, and finally in Greece. My deceased wife was in Berlin to hear JFK give his famous "Ich bin ein Berliner " speech and was in Germany when JFK was assassinated. She was in Greece when his brother RFK and Martin Luther King was assassinated
Both Janet and James families have been US Citizens for Generations.

I became Christopher Sinback's step father when he was 6 years old. My mother family "the Holladays" have been in the US since the 1600s in Jamestown and my father's family "the Krelle's" was an early settler of Omaha, Nebraska and 1850s Dutch Fork, South Carolina. Christopher's Grandfather, Arthur Krelle, is a WWII army veteran and a retired Los Angeles County Sheriff.

After filing for Christopher's US pasport, Janet was advised that her 41 year old adopted son would be deported. Shortly afterward Janet died of a massive stroke on June 21, 2007, one month before her 71st birthday. The pressure and fear of having her handicapped child deported to either Germany or Greece was too much for her. Christopher left Germany and then Greece as an infant and does not speak either language. see email from Greek Embassy about being stateless

Another tragedy that we face is the inability to inter my wife ashes by the Isle de Sacrifios in Veracruz, Mexico - see photo -where her first husband, a retired US navy veteran, and Christopher adoptive father's ashes are interred

The Department of Homeland Security's Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) Office in Los Angeles stated that due to a 3 year sentence on an arson plea bargain in 1990 and a 11 month and 25 day sentence for petty theft for pawning his girlfriend Sheila's 50 dollar ring in 1999, that he was deportable. The Sessions Court in Tennessee has reduced the sentence to 6 months to qualify the conviction as a petty offense after getting turned down for a pardon from the Governor of Tennessee see 8 USC Section 1227 Deportable aliens (2) Criminal offenses

In 1996 the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 changed the law from a 5 year plus sentence being deportable to 1 year plus. The law did not take into account the adopted children of US Citizens with Childhood Mental Disabilities who might get into trouble when they got older.

Even his "mental disorder", which was caused by the starvation and abuse he suffered as an orphan, now could make him "Inadmissible".
see 8 USC Section 1182 Inadmissible aliens (a) (1) (iii)

After filing for Christopher's N-600 (Certificate of Citizenship) we found out about the case of Joao Herbert an orphan from Brazil adopted by 2 US parents who got deported 2002 and murdered in Brazil 2004, and several other outrageous cases,
see Orlando Weekly Article. After reading about these cases Janet broke down with fear and guilt for not filing the paperwork before he turned 18.

Also see articles in the San Diego Union-Tribune about Jesse Mustanich, who was just deported to El Salvador on July 10, 2008. Foreign adoptee's try to avoid deportation and U.S. adoptee a stranger in his birthplace

The State Department had told Janet and James in Athens, Greece that their adopted son would become a US Citizen on his 18th Birthday, a fact that we found out was not true. We have filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the State Department but have got no cooperation from them

This has been the pattern from all branches of the US Federal Government that we have contacted since we innocently applied for a US Passport for Christopher at the Los Angeles Passport Agency right after Katrina, which triggered this whole fiasco. We tried to get Christopher a US Passport due to the new entry requirements into the US from Mexico. We thought Christopher was a US Citizen, even his FBI Rap Sheet says he is a US Citizen.

All we wanted to do was take a trip to Mexico, which we had done for years, and work on our non-profit projects on a proposed Gulf of Mexico Scenic Highway and to educate the public about costal erosion, loss of barrier islands and wetlands that protect cities such as New Orleans from the ravages of Hurricanes. And to promote sustainable economic development in the poor areas in southern Mexico to give people an alternative to work in their own country instead of having to come to the US to find work. see article about our work in the El Imparcial Newspaper in Oaxaca City and see OaxacaMarket.org.

Now my step son and I are in the fight of our life's trying to get his Citizenship and not having him deported: to where? Germany waived his Citizenship to be adopted and Greece gave him a one month passport to come to the US. He was declared an IR-3 (Immediate Relative) in Greece in1968 by the Secretary of State and became a Legal Permanent Resident (LPR) upon arriving in the Port of New York also in 1968.

Mom with Chris in 1975

Chris with his step dad in 1974

Christopher with Sheila his US girlfriend
of 9 years and Mom

Christopher Sinback was born out of wedlock in Heidelberg, Germany on July 20, 1966 to a German Girl and a Greek Guest Worker. His natural father returned to Greece and his natural mother couldn't handle him and drove to Greece to drop him off.

In the little village that Christopher was brought to, a half German illegitimate child was culturally unacceptable and Christopher was not being fed anything but a porridge (pap) of corn starch. He was severely malnourished and it took many months to restore his health. Unfortunately, Janet and James were not able to restore his mental heath. He suffered brain damage and it left him mentally retarded and suffering from paranoid schizophrenia.

Christopher has been receiving treatment since he was 5 years old. He went to the Devereux Foundation School in Santa Barbara and also spent time in several adolescent mental health hospitals. Despite the special education and schooling, Christopher could not learn how to read or write. This also complicated getting him naturalized after he turned 18 before he got arrested at 22 years of age.

The crime that he pleaded to was arson. He confessed to starting a pile of phone books on fire. The phone books didn't catch on fire but smoldered until a passerby put them out. Under pressure after the preliminary hearing from the public defender, police and the fire investor he agreed to the plea bargain. He clearly did not understand the consequences that his plea bargain would have on his immigration status. On January 10, 2008 the Superior Court of Orange County vacated the conviction due to violations of due process. see OC Court's motion to vacate and See letter from Public Defender.

Since we have been here in Barstow, CA after fleeing New Orleans and Katrina and after we filing the N-600 we have contacted Congressman McKeon, Senators Fienstein and Boxer as well our Senators from Louisiana. We also faxed all members of the Senate and members of the House Judiciary Committee and the House Foreign Affairs to gain their support. See also fax to Congressman Jeff Flake

Congresswoman Jo Anne Davies (R) First District of Virginia, who sadly passed away last year due to breast cancer, has reintroduced the ICARE Act - H. R. 120: To reform Federal procedures relating to intercountry adoption. Letter to Congresswoman Davies. This would fix the mess that people like us are in, people who I guess just messed up and didn't fill out the right forms before their children became 18. Shame on us, it is not the orphaned child's fault.

We Believed in our government's (the State Department) word and the rule of law, not thinking that the law could be so cold nor so cruel to US Citizens who try to do the right and humane thing by adopting starving foreign born orphans and bringing them to the land of the free. Sure it is wrong and sad when they do criminal and/or stupid acts, but they our are "Immediate Relatives" and the children of US Citizens and should face their punishment here in the United States. He is a product of US society and we should not deport our problems to other countries.

The final outcome of this nightmare is uncertain, so pray for us.

We have filed for a N-400 naturalization in February, and requested expedited processing based on the USCIS web site expedite criteria and the adjudicators manuel (see letter to request expedited processing among with information about our non-profits organizations and letters to USCIS Acting Director, Jonathan Scharfen and Michael T. Dougherty, Ombudsman of CIS ) but were turned down due to the USCIS contention that all of are suffering and hardships that we have endured were the fault of the State Department and Christopher's adoptive parents for not filing before he turned 18.

And even if true, nowhere is fault mentioned in the expedite criteria. The problem with the USCIS is that they do not even follow their own rules and believe that they are above the laws that they are sworn to uphold.

Due to the complete incompetence and lack of planning of the USCIS, that when they raised the fees in July of 2007, they claimed to be caught off guard by causing the processing times of a N-400 (Naturalization) to go from 6 months to over a 18-20 months due to a so called surge. So we are supposed to wait in fear and trepidation for at least another year before we even are supposed to get a hearing, with no guarantee of the outcome.

Do to that sad fact we have filed a writ of Mandamus with the Federal District Court to compel the USCIS to hear our case and to challenge the constitutionality of denying mentally retarded orphans who were adopted by US Citizens from them inclusion in the Child Citizenship Act, since they are forever locked in Tender Age and don't have the capacity to naturalize on their own accord and as a class have endured many years of injustice and discrimination in the criminal justice system. It is my hope that if small hole can be made in the unbelievably draconian laws about adopted children, then maybe common since will prevail and a solution found for all orphans adopted by US Citizens before 1983.

Please send your Senators and Congressman a letter of support for H. R. 120. or a change in the Child Citizen Act of 2000 to cover the adult adopted children of US Citizens that are not covered by current law, i.e. Orphans who were born before 1983.

All we seek is an end to this nightmare and a get a little humanity and compassion from our government and perhaps some common sense