Hi,

-Originally came to US as a F-1 student.
-After 3 years of studying, I got married with a US citizen-Very happy with my life and my marriage.
-After I got married, I stopped going to school and just a month after Homeland security knocked our door and took me in custody.They took my passport and ID and never gave back to me.
- Because I have no criminal record or anything illegal in my papers, my father in law was able to pay the immigration bond and took me out.

I know I should have applied for green card immediately right after I got married but for financial reasons, I couldn't do it on time.

I hired a lawyer, she filed the documents for green card. It's been 8 months since they officially got the application and still no response from them. I checked my case number from the official website and it still seems it's in the "initial review" part which is the first step in whole 6 steps. Next court date is on march 2013 and I really don't want to pay her one more time for nothing...

Each court costs me an average $3000 and there is no progress.My lawyer shows up in the court to hear "removibility suspended" and I have to pay her just because she shows up there. I mean, literally she only speaks about 10 seconds (maybe even less)each court and it keep costing me money.

From this point, I started to think that there is no benefit of having a private lawyer rather than having a free one which government offers.

We already started sending letters to a senator on the issue to finalize this meaningless case which holds me back from having a work permit, SSN, proper ID etc...

Does anybody out there who can give me an advice ?
Suggestions ?

I don't think you are entitled to a free lawyer for non-criminal cases... and you would be means tested even then and if you had the ability to pay you would nopt get one.

And anyway.. expect to spend a LOT more... a whole lot more before its over.

You broke the law and violated the terms of your F-1 VISA, you put yourself into this mess... and as you found out... getting married doesn't change anything, except make it harder.

And incidentally, being here on an expired VISA makes you undocumented and that is a crime.

And incidentally to apply for a green card you would have had to been here legally in some manner that has a path to citizenship... an F-1 wasn't... your application for a green card would have been rejected even if you had made it right after getting married... because like I said, getting married does not make you automatically elligible to get a green card.

You should have researched this before you put yourself into this mess... and how do I know all of this? I went through it 21 years ago with my wife before you could simply surf the web to get the information... it would actually be far easier for you to do this from your home country because of your current status.