CRIMINAL REHABILITATION and PERMANENT RESIDENCE APPLICATIONS

[VatoQChopeful]

I have a question and hopefully somebody here will have an answer!

I am a US citizen and my husband is a Canadian citizen. We were married March 2015. I'm currently living in the US and he is in Canada. We are planning on applying for PR through spousal sponsorship. Here is the problem.... In August of 2008 I was arrested for DUI. This is my first and only criminal offense. I completed my sentence of 1 year driving restriction, VASAP class, and fines August of 2009. I know that I have to apply for criminal rehabilitation but my question is this - Should I apply for Criminal Rehabilitation first or can I submit the criminal rehabilitation application WITH my application for Permanent Residence? I have read that you can apply for a Temporary Residence Permit and Criminal Rehab at the same time, but haven't found anything about PR and Criminal Rehab. Would the application process be any faster to apply together or separately?Any information or suggestions would be greatly appreciate!

Thanks in advance

 

[bartjones]

You can submit the Criminal rehabilitation application with the PR application. I think since you are in the US however there may be a much faster way to deal with your criminality issue. How close are you to a land crossing into Canada? If getting to one of those is feasible, I'll let you know how to deal with your inadmissibility issue there.

 

[VatoQChopeful]

You can submit the Criminal rehabilitation application with the PR application. I think since you are in the US however there may be a much faster way to deal with your criminality issue. How close are you to a land crossing into Canada? If getting to one of those is feasible, I'll let you know how to deal with your inadmissibility issue there.

I'm about 10 hours south of the closest Canadian border crossing. However, I would be willing to hear what you have to say!

 

[bartjones]

I see. That's a bit of a hike but here's what you can do if you want.

Prepare the Application For Criminal Rehabilitation. Check, double check and triple check it to make sure it's complete and you have all the required documents. Drive to the border. Tell the CBSA officer that you are not seeking to enter Canada because you have a DUI conviction but simply want to go into the CBSA office to submit an application for criminal rehabilitation. He will allow you to go into the office. You submit the application there. They'll look it all over and, assuming it's complete, accept it. The length of time it takes to process will vary from border crossing to border crossing. The Detroit-Windsor tunnel was processing them in about 3 weeks last year.

Once you've submitted the application and paid the fee they will then turn you around and send you back to the US. Sometime later you’ll get a letter at your home from CBSA advising of their decision. Assuming the DUI is your only conviction, you should be fine.

While at the border, if you wish to enter Canada you can also request a TRP. They will often grant those on the spot where the DUI is the only issue.

I did this with my wife last year who also had an old DUI. CBSA at Detroit-Windsor processed her application in a mere 3 days. Compare that with the 6 months to a year it takes through a normal visa office.

After you've submitted the rehabilitation application, you can submit your PR application and tell them in your covering letter that the rehabilitation application is in progress. My guess is that doing it this way will shave at least 3-4 months off your processing time. Good luck.

 

[bigredmoose]

+1 bartjones

 

[Gemmie]

If your going to the windsor detroit border, you will be having to stay over due to the long distance in travel.

I would recommend you stay closer to the airport, and out of the inner city.

There is a pretty nice hotel , think its called Americas Best Value Inn in Romulus. You can google that . It has a mini fridge and has
been updated and it super clean.

Its also fairly priced. Sure you can hear the planes, but there is a restaurant beside it, a pizza place for fast food.

Great advice bartjones

 

[VatoQChopeful]

I see. That's a bit of a hike but here's what you can do if you want.

Prepare the Application For Criminal Rehabilitation. Check, double check and triple check it to make sure it's complete and you have all the required documents. Drive to the border. Tell the CBSA officer that you are not seeking to enter Canada because you have a DUI conviction but simply want to go into the CBSA office to submit an application for criminal rehabilitation. He will allow you to go into the office. You submit the application there. They'll look it all over and, assuming it's complete, accept it. The length of time it takes to process will vary from border crossing to border crossing. The Detroit-Windsor tunnel was processing them in about 3 weeks last year.

Once you've submitted the application and paid the fee they will then turn you around and send you back to the US. Sometime later you'll get a letter at your home from CBSA advising of their decision. Assuming the DUI is your only conviction, you should be fine.

While at the border, if you wish to enter Canada you can also request a TRP. They will often grant those on the spot where the DUI is the only issue.

I did this with my wife last year who also had an old DUI. CBSA at Detroit-Windsor processed her application in a mere 3 days. Compare that with the 6 months to a year it takes through a normal visa office.

After you've submitted the rehabilitation application, you can submit your PR application and tell them in your covering letter that the rehabilitation application is in progress. My guess is that doing it this way will shave at least 3-4 months off your processing time. Good luck.

Wow! Thank you so much for this information!! That is definitely something to think about. I had read something about this but the post was from several years ago ( 2009) so I wasn't sure if that was still an option. It's definitely something to consider since it will save us so much time in the long run!

 

[VatoQChopeful]

If your going to the windsor detroit border, you will be having to stay over due to the long distance in travel.

I would recommend you stay closer to the airport, and out of the inner city.

There is a pretty nice hotel , think its called Americas Best Value Inn in Romulus. You can google that . It has a mini fridge and has
been updated and it super clean.

Its also fairly priced. Sure you can hear the planes, but there is a restaurant beside it, a pizza place for fast food.

Great advice bartjones

Thanks for the advice on a place to stay! We will definitely we taking this into consideration!

 

[bartjones]

If you do decide to go to Detroit-Windsor to do it, do it at the tunnel crossing, not the bridge crossing. The processing times at the bridge were much longer than at the tunnel. Best of luck.

 

[VatoQChopeful]

I did this with my wife last year who also had an old DUI. CBSA at Detroit-Windsor processed her application in a mere 3 days. Compare that with the 6 months to a year it takes through a normal visa office.

Do you happen to remember if your wife's conviction had passed the 10 year mark or not?

 

[bartjones]

Do you happen to remember if your wife's conviction had passed the 10 year mark or not?

It hadn't. We'd barely reached the 5 year mark when we did it.

 

[VatoQChopeful]

It hadn't. We'd barely reached the 5 year mark when we did it.

Ah, that's fantastic news! Thank you!

 

[lastflightout]

Bartjones

Is there any way to contact the tunnel office at Windsor? Just need info about if I would need to make another payment for submitting another application for the same thing. Thx

 

[PMM]

Hi

Ah, that's fantastic news! Thank you!

1. Before you get too excited, you should read the following: http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/information/inadmissibility/rehabilitation.asp#a2

If you live in the U.S. you may travel to a Canadian Port of Entry and ask to be assessed. You must bring all documents related to your criminal history in support of your claim of being rehabilitated. See which documents you need [Document Checklist - Rehabilitation (PDF, 179.76 KB)]. An immigration officer at the port of entry will review them to determine if you can be deemed rehabilitated and allowed to enter Canada.

If you are not deemed rehabilitated, you will have to apply for individual rehabilitation at a visa office. If you are not sure you will be deemed rehabilitated at the point of entry, or if you need a visa to enter Canada, you should apply for individual rehabilitation.

Assessment of deemed rehabilitation at a Port of Entry is a completely different process from applying for rehabilitation at a visa office. Visit the website of the office where you will be submitting your application for a list of requirements.

Note: if you do not want to risk being denied entry to Canada or subject to other enforcement action, you should apply according to the visa office’s instructions before approaching the Port of Entry. A fee is required.

If you live overseas, you may also travel without applying, but be aware that you are risking being turned away at the port of entry. See Being assessed by a visa office above to find out how to keep this risk at a minimum.

 

[Sunset0505]

We are Apr 2014 and our case continues...Hubby had a TRP that was approved to Sept 2015 and after one year they asked for an entire new Rehab we just by luck we had sent to New York and LA requested the file..they have requested meds three times and we live in VA and had to fly to LA in Nov 2015 at a cost of about $2k for plane and hotel for an interview to produce half the court documents from a case 25 years ago, half because the docs do not exist anymore ...So do not plan for an easy ride...there is a back log of 400K people trying to get into Canada and 25K to be processed within the next 4 months that have nothing to do with the back log...the border would not even look at my husband to do a case at the border and they told him if they feel threatened in any way they can detain him...once he had his TRP things were good but do not count on the border working with you...