Needs visa to visit me in US, big question is....

It's very annoying because by September 2012, my conviction will be spent under UK law (rehab period is 5 years) and I will never have to mention it again to employers/other officials unless they ask for both spent and unspent convictions, but it will always be hanging over my head for US visits/visas .

I feel for you, I really do feel badly for you. So not only does the US not want to play ball with the UK on drivers licence exchange, but also on offences  -- some decades old! --considered by the UK itself as spent. I find that unecessarily harsh. I don't know you but you probably have a lot to offer any country. And though I hate saying anything good about my ex (!!!) so did he. He had left his juvey past waaaay behind. He had become a highly qualified person in his field. With all due respect for the country that was my home for almost half my life, it seems petty to hold even the oldest of non-violent records over a person's head forever.

So not only does the US not want to play ball with the UK on drivers licence exchange, but also on offences  -- some decades old! --considered by the UK itself as spent. I find that unecessarily harsh.

It's not just the US though - when you apply for a visa for any country, anything you have done will go under their laws because you are going to their country. It has nothing to do with the fact that it is spent in the UK, because I would not be going to a country that enforces UK law.

Canada views drink-driving as a felony, which means that I am not allowed to enter Canada for at least 5 years (and even then I would have to apply for rehabilitation to be allowed in).

For Americans coming to the UK, the spent rule does apply and often offenses that are considered spent under UK law will have little or no bearing on a visa application, even though they are not considered spent in the US.

And, I do remember someone here, quite a while ago, who had a similiar record of youthful indiscretion who attempted to come to the UK.  They got caught under the "good character" rule, but I think he worked it out in the end.

At the end of the day, not requiring permission before you travel to another country is a luxery that many westerners are over accustomed to.  It is a matter of due course for a lot of people all over the world.  My partner got bounced from the US.  Has never comitted a crime but they suspect he might be looking for work.  He was 100% honest with the Immigration Officers in the States, but the problem was he was visiting me a little too often for the comfort of the US ICE and so the bounced him.  Now, he has to apply for a visa to enter the US and actually refuses to because he is scared of going through the whole ordeal again, because even having a visa doesn't mean ICE has to let you pass.

If it is the case that the US does not consider even a non-violent, juvenile record as never spent, never voided, then my ex, and two of his friends, clearly must have had wrong information, have taken an unwise risk, and were very lucky not to be hauled up for it. Which is pretty frightening in retrospect....

Although, I can't explain how their records never got pulled up automatically on computer at the border; my boyfriend entered twice in full belief that he was "clear", and nothing came up on him. These two friends of his, I don't know if they believed they were "clear" too or if they knew they were dodging a bullet, but apparently they have traveled back and forth for numerous vacations and their British juvenile records never got brought up in the system....

My ex was so 100% sure he had ascertained that even according to US policy his UK record was a non-issue.

From the Embassy website on Criminal Convictions (http://www.usembassy.org.uk/cons_new/visa/niv/add_crime.html):

Under United States visa law, people who have been arrested at anytime are required to declare the arrest when applying for a visa. If the arrest resulted in a conviction, the individual may be permanently ineligible to receive a visa. In order to travel, a waiver of the permanent ineligibility is required. The Rehabilitation of Offenders Act does not apply to United States visa law. Therefore, even travelers with a spent conviction are required to declare the arrest and/or conviction.

It does not specify Juvenile or Adult, just arrests & convictions.

WebyJ, you're a google whiz!

WebyJ, you're a google whiz!

TA! Mort 

Thank you WebyJ -- that clears up much, although as you say, it doesn't mention specifically juvenile offences. I think my ex focused on not just the spent status but on the fact that there is usually a distinction made between non-violent offences committed either before or after that dividing line of being a minor or an adult. I guess that's what he was counting on, and probably also the two friends who assured him about this also, correct or incorrect.

And to all parties, myself included, it just didn't seem to make sense that something that he did as a kid, 25 years ago would potentially create a problem for a ten day visit. And he never did have a problem, no unusual questioning, nothing at all; he was an ordinary visitor, they took him as such, and raised no red flags. I assume he filled out the form with a "no" to the questions regarding convictions. But he did it in good faith as he believed -- wrongly we all know now -- that spent meant spent....all over the western hemisphere at least.... It's an easy assumption to make because as you point out, we are used to believing permission to freely visit is a "given" -- millions do it every day.

He, and apparently his friends who have regularly vacationed in the US, just filled out those forms thinking their "no" to the conviction question was technically an honest one. It is an honest lack of full knowledge of what the US regard as true information or not. Or even if someone is aware that they are fudging this issue, well, how many visitors every day must be filling out that form with a "no" to the question about using illicit recreational drugs, fully knowing that this one is a lie in their case? That is something lied about upon visiting other countries with probably far more frequency.

Midnightblue- In regard to your friend all I can say is that they got lucky, and with the new ETSA system in place they may not be so lucky in the future. And as I learned through my Political Science courses in UNI and through my Law Enforcement friends when I worked in Government, Ignorance of the Law is No Defence...one MUST do their homework before visiting another country no matter how close the ties are between the two countries (IE UK & the US).

Midnightblue- In regard to your friend all I can say is that they got lucky, and with the new ETSA system in place they may not be so lucky in the future. And as I learned through my Political Science courses in UNI and through my Law Enforcement friends when I worked in Government, Ignorance of the Law is No Defence...one MUST do their homework before visiting another country no matter how close the ties are between the two countries (IE UK & the US).

I agree, I guess they did get lucky, and I'm sure that now there are stricter checks in place this won't be the case in future.

I also understand that ignorance of the law is no defence and no excuse either -- I want to stress that I'm in no way trying to say that.   

And I'm not defending or making a case for flouting the law of any country, but one does have to stop and wonder -- by these standards, then, a great, great many people either visiting the US merely on vacations and shopping trips or even applying for immigration status, would have to fess up to the proverbial apple stolen at age fifteen, or indeed pot still being smoked as a recreational habit -- and face possible ban or at least complications.

I'd wager money thousands are still not being that honest.

By that standard, a huge chunk, far greater than owns up to anything right now, will theoretically have to apply for permission rather than visit on the traditional regular visa waiver. I guarantee you, at least before the stricter screenings came in, that literally millions were blithely entering the US knowing that they don't quite meet eligibility for waiver of a visa, for one reason or another, but they go ahead, have their US vacation, go shopping in NYC, soak up some sun in Florida and go home again without incident -- and also without having run rampage committing crimes....

Again, NOT defending the breaking of laws, but just being realistic in saying that millions of otherwise-upstanding citizens (or even the casual pot smoker, of which I am not one but many are....) with something to fudge will have to apply for visas if following the strict letter of the law...

Having said that, regarding again specifially the law as pertains to a spent juvenile non-violent conviction -- I do have to say, in my opinion, that is a ridiculous law. If the person has done nothing further for 25 years and is now just living their life intending no threat to the country they are visiting, it should be dead and gone, done and dusted as it is in the eyes of the person's home country.

I know that law isn't going to change just because I think it's unnecessary and stupid, and also in fact unfair, but I really believe it is all those things. This isn't even something I personally have to worry about -- I'm glad to say I've lived such a deathly boring life that there are no convictions in my closet, only because Jane Austen's got nothing on me for uneventful living, lol!! But the principal of the thing just pisses me off. Spent should be spent, and 25 years of living within the law should be accepted as the end of the matter.

Well all I can say is that 'the proverbial stolen apple' in some countries would just get your hand chopped off too. That, I see as unfair.

However, the US implements their laws as a protection and precaution to their citizens, just as the new BCI bill that is being presented in Parliament is a protection to the UK and its citizens. I don't like it but, in the end, I do have to live within it and the restrictions it places upon me as an immigrant.

Well all I can say is that 'the proverbial stolen apple' in some countries would just get your hand chopped off too. That, I see as unfair.

However, the US implements their laws as a protection and precaution to their citizens, just as the new BCI bill that is being presented in Parliament is a protection to the UK and its citizens. I don't like it but, in the end, I do have to live within it and the restrictions it places upon me as an immigrant.

Fair points. No argument there; I too, as an immigrant to the US during the time I held green card status there, also had to be sure to live within the restrictions and requirements, having also applied the same to my process of aquiring legal status of permanet residency.

I still believe folks in their millions, casually as tourists entering either country, or indeed any country, are not always by playing the letter of the law as conscientiously.

 just as the new BCI bill that is being presented in Parliament is a protection to the UK and its citizens.

Bullshit.  It is being implemented to be deliberately unfair and unjust to migrants, with the sole aim of winning a General Election.

Protection of citizens is nothing to do with it.

Vicky

Bullshit.  It is being implemented to be deliberately unfair and unjust to migrants, with the sole aim of winning a General Election.

Protection of citizens is nothing to do with it.

Vicky

 

This is how I feel, it's nice to hear someone else say it!

Bullshit.  It is being implemented to be deliberately unfair and unjust to migrants, with the sole aim of winning a General Election.

Protection of citizens is nothing to do with it.

Vicky

Hear hear!

There isn't ONE THING in the BCI that protects the Citizenship of the UK.