Firm Secures Special Immigrant Juvenile Visa Status for Honduran Child

August 2024 - HHR secured Special Immigrant Juvenile (SIJ) visa status in the U.S. for a child who had been abused, abandoned and neglected while growing up in Honduras.

The firm received the case in 2023 from Kids in Need of Defense (KIND), a national non-profit organization that provides legal counsel to unaccompanied immigrant children in the U.S.

Prior to coming to our U.S., the client grew up in Honduras with his mother, father and younger brother. What began as a normal childhood took a drastic change when, at just seven years old, he became the subject of repeated physical and emotional abuse from his mother. This abuse continued for three years, until the client's mother abandoned the family when he was ten years old, without so much as saying goodbye.

Jessica Lagnado and Tyler Bloom interviewed the client and his father and prepared all of the court papers to obtain both guardianship and SIJ status. They then represented him at the hearing at Queens Family Court in New York.

The Court appointed the client's father as his sole guardian, waived service on the client's mother on the basis of abandonment, and granted our client SIJ status. This part of the case was achieved in record time, and paves the way for the client, who's now 18, to get a permanent resident's “green card" and work authorization, providing a road to citizenship.

This positive outcome is the result of the hard work and collaboration of Jessica, Tyler, James Henseler, Elizabeth Beitler and Vilia Hayes.