(Visit to Law Firm) Law Firm Gongjon in the area of immigration control

 

(Visit to law firm) Law Firm Gongjon in the area of immigration control

A specialist lawyer of 'immigration case' with 5-years manager of nationality and refugee section

 

A special law firm controls immigration being unfamiliar to common citizens, for instance, release of visa and permanent residency, and help of immigration offenders to be given attention. It's law firm Gongjon. Representative lawyer Cha Gyu-geun (46 years old, 24th term graduate of Judicial Research and Training Institute) worked for immigration department 5 years to succeed in specialization of 'immigration cases'. He recruited director Kim Seung-gi and director Lee Jong-ok who worked for immigration more than 30 years by taking opportunity of 5-years service of manager of Nationality and Refugee Section to be given consulting service depending upon types of cases.

 

Three years after foundation, newly born law firm Gongjon is proud of professionalism at each area. See photo from left-hand area: lawyer Geum Tae-seob, director Lee Jong-ok, lawyer Jeon Jong-min, lawyer Cha Gyu-geun, director Kim Seung-gi, lawyer Kim A-rim, lawyer Go A-yeon, lawyer Shin Eun-yeong, lawyer Kim Nam-hui (photographer and reporter Baek Seong-hyeon)

 

In 2006, lawyer Cha took office of manager of nationality and refugee being opened official in the Ministry of Justice for the first time to work 2 years and to extend office term and to fill 5-years legal limit and to be top class specialist in the area. When completing office term and returning to lawyer job, he could not assure of demand on immigration. He completed 5-years service of manager of nationalty and refugee section to go to Japan to study 2 years, so that he worried about long time vacancy of lawyer job. He started to do immigration being familiar to do, and fortunately demand on legal service increased owing to rapid growth of long term foreigner residents. His law firm has become specialist naturally. The Chinese residents occupied the largest ratio, so that he employed Chinese speaking employee consultants to speak in the Chinese language with direct phone call number.

 

Law firm Gongjon has given legal service of immigration offender, foreigners' extension of staying, permanent residency, and nationality. Gongjon's legal service of immigration offender has included deportation order and/or departure order of the ones who were given criminal punishment of fine to be immigration offender when foreigner resided in Korea legally. Lawyer Cha said, "Foreigners who were given criminal punishment of fine to be asked to leave Korea could not express their ideas because of poor speaking of the Korean language, and did not take actions without knowledge upon legal procedures. At that time, I helped them express their intention to give legal help."

 

Migrant's life base relies upon extension of the stay. Migrants who have made life base while living life in Korea for a long time to be given departure sudden order may visit law firm Gongjon. Lawyer Cha shall visit immigration control office to apply to extension of the stay. He raises lawsuit of cancellation of departure order when a migrant is given fine sentence at minor violence with friends or is given emotional lawsuit from neighbor or commits crime by mistake. Lawyer Cha said, "The administrative action against foreigners may be difficult to cancel departure order. However, departure of foreigner living reasonable life in Korea requires careful consideration. The Immigration Act has same level of departure reason of foreigner as prohibition of the entry into Korea to be too much harsh against foreigners.

 

Foreigners who have stayed in Korea for a long time have rapidly increased to have more cases.

Foreigners' extension of the stay, permanent residency and nationality cases are typical.

Even allocation despite different difficulty and income of the case

 

At growth of international marriage, married and naturalized citizen and/or foreigner spouse of Korean citizen have applied to status of residence. Lawyer Cha said, "Easy international marriage in the past produced a lot of adverse effect such as fake marriage to inspect international marriage strictly and to produce bona fide sufferer. Migrant's poor explanation of true marriage has made misunderstanding to be given disapproval order."

 

Korean Chinese migrants who look to speak Korean language well may commit mistake at details. Lawyer Cha said, "I visited house that the couple lived life, and took picture and asked neighbor to be a witness in order to succeed in the case. Evidence of truth of the marriage shall be important, and most of fact relations are complicated to require a lot of works."

 

Cases that could not be solved by administrative agency's guides were solved according to the court's judgment. Investigation into permanent residency of foreigners who stay in Korea has adopted nationality inspection standard for foreigners who have not entered Korea yet. Lawyer Cha said, "A migrant should have a certain level of relatives in Korea according to regulation of investigation into permanent residency: The cases of the applicant that we took were out of scope of the relatives. The Ministry of Justice made decision of no permit of permanent residency according to the guide when the case was out of the scope, and the applicant was forced to rely upon the court's judgment. The migrant had not 8-chon kinship but 9-chon kinship relative living in Korea according to kinship certificate as well as genetic testing: The court judged winning of the applicant.

 

Lawyer Cha started to work at law office Gongjon for the first time in 2011. On year later, he established law firm Gongjon with help of Lee Chang-hwan (47 years old, 29th term) and Jeon Jong-min (47 years old, 24th term) who were college classmate entering the college in 1986. Lawyer Geum Tae-seob (47 years old, 24th term) has recently joined law firm Gongjon, and lawyer Cha has been representative lawyer of the law firm. Lawyer Cha said that he had difficulty at management of the law firm by immigration case only to take common cases. Lawyer Jeon from judge of Administrative Court takes administrative and civil cases, and lawyer Lee who gave legal service of enterprises at labor affairs team of law firm Pacific Ocean takes non-regular worker cases to represent labor workers. Lawyer Geum has taken criminal cases. Lawyer income and income of the case may vary depending upon areas to adopt not separation but commonness. The reporter gave question that the lawyers might complain at sharing of income of immigration case with less income. Remaining three lawyers said that law firm name of Gongjon meant coexistence to have various kinds of cases together. They said, "We agreed with the matter from the time of foundation of the firm."

 

Lawyer Cha said, "More than 1.5 million foreigners stay in Korea. Lawsuit on foreigners is thought to be out of regular business, and associated legal systems are less human rights friendly to keep in order." He added, "Legal experts shall raise problems as many as possible, and the court should be accustomed to the case to judge in advanced way."