Attorney Neil J. Sheff has had many celebrity clients, including Portuguese American actress, Daniela Ruah, one of the stars of “NCIS-Los Angeles.” (photo courtesy of N0eil J. Sheff)

During the past 22 years of practicing immigration law, Beverly Hills attorney Neil J. Sheff said he has seen just about every type of case. He said there is no shortage of people seeking pathways to enter the United States or remain in the country legally with a visa or green card.

The immigration process can be fraught with unsuspected difficulties, from unscrupulous consultants and notaries who dupe and swindle people trying to obtain legal residency status, to mountains of paperwork and applications that must be submitted and lengthy delays and backlogs in the system that can cause the process to drag on for years. Even with the pitfalls, Sheff said it is important for people seeking legal residency to check their options, even if they think there are no legal pathways to citizenship.

“There are categories of people who still may qualify for different benefits, or if they’re here legally, to just be able to use the system properly to get to the ultimate goal of having permanent residency,” Sheff said. “Some had a case they started that never went through, or they were a minor and their parents started a case. There are some ways that a lot of people don’t know about, and they can still take advantage of that.”

Sheff said when he started practicing immigration law in 2001, the deadline was nearing for a Clinton administration-era law that allowed people in the country illegally to pay a fine and stay during the application process, as long as they had a job or sponsor. He said thousands of people were seeking immigration services and long lines formed around the federal buildings. Since then, the immigration process has become much more stringent, he added. Still, there are “small openings, cracks in the door” that may enable some people to become permanent residents.

“The first question is, have you been here since before 2001? If you entered illegally, maybe we find a way that they can still have a golden ticket from that period. A parent had a child and maybe now the child has grown, but we’ll use that as a ticket to entry and to pay that penalty fee,” Sheff said. “There are a lot [of people] who didn’t know or didn’t realize [they qualify] or maybe can’t find their paperwork. I’ll get someone who comes in and says, ‘Oh, I didn’t know I qualified.’ Or if they did enter legally with a passport and then just fell out of their status and became illegal, that opens a couple other options.”

Sheff said he gets many questions about options for residency through marriage, which have heightened with the popularity of the TLC show “90 Day Fiancé.” The show follows couples – usually one person from the United States and another from a foreign country – who obtain 90-day visas and must marry so they can stay together in the country. Sheff said there are many options for citizenship through marriage, but warned that the process can take years.

“In those situations, it’s sort of a two-step. You file first in the U.S. with the immigration department. They approve it, and then you have to wait for an appointment for an interview at the consulate or embassy abroad for the fiancé,” Sheff said. “Some of the cases that you see, sometimes they’re just unbelievable. But we see all kinds.”

Sheff said he is happy to speak to anyone about their immigration case, and can usually determine within minutes whether or not someone has a chance of successfully completing the citizenship process. He said while it is disappointing to have to tell people they do not qualify, it is very rewarding helping those who do navigate the process and achieve the American dream.

“I give people advice and talk with them, and that’s what I do most of the time, a lot of consulting just to see what can be done. I try to help people so they don’t get scammed,” Sheff said. “One of the greatest things about me having gotten into this line of work, because it may not make me rich, but I go home at night and I’m happy. I can see that people’s lives change. And when you hand them their passport or their green card, the happiness is hard to describe. They are just over the moon.”