Michael Shannon Morano

I work in the equestrian field and I am also an international show jumper. I consulted with 3 other attorneys before going to Mr Morano’s office. All 3 of the attorneys said the only way I could get a visa was to open up a company in the US, invest at least $150,000 in it, and apply for an investor v...isa. These attorneys could not give me straight answer to what happens if I invest $150,000 and then my visa gets denied, so I did not feel comfortable with their advice. A fellow Brit jumper recommended his attorney, Michael Morano. What a difference. Mr. Morano reviewed my jumping CV, and said the investor visa was not necessary because I could qualify for an equestrian visa. I hired him and 6 weeks later my equestrian visa was approved for 5 years - and without having to invest my life savings into a risky investment!! I have since recommended Mr Morano to several athletes and farm owners and they are all happy with his services as well.

I was referred to Mr. Morano by a friend who said he did an excellent job on his case too. I’m from Greece and came to the U.S. in 1987. Over the past 16 years I had been represented by a very well-known immigration lawyer who charged me almost $40,000 and after all these years and all this money I ...paid in legal fees, I still had no legal status. In 2001 this “famous” lawyer convinced me to do this very complicated (and expensive) case in immigration court. I contacted Mr. Morano at the time to get a second opinion, and he told me I should instead do a labor certification case because I would have been protected from deportation under a law called INA 245(i). I mentioned that to my lawyer, but then he insisted that I should go forward with my court case because he was confident I would win. (I realized later on that he wanted to do the court case instead because he could make a lot more money on it than the case Mr. Morano proposed). Well, I lost the court case and I ended up with a deportation order. On top of everything, I missed my opportunity to file under INA 245(i), like Mr. Morano originally suggested, because the deadline passed. My lawyer then filed an appeal. And there the case sat for 8 years. In the meantime I married a U.S. citizen and had 2 kids, but I could not get a green card because of my old deportation order. I finally went back to Mr. Morano to see what he could do. After reviewing the copy of my file Mr. Morano found out that my ex-lawyer did not even file my appeal correctly, so it had never really been filed! This is after I paid the old lawyer $14,000 just for the appeal! To make a long-story short, Mr. Morano reopened my deportation order based on ineffective assistance of counsel. I was then able to adjust status and get my green card – all because of Mr. Morano’s great legal work. The only regret I have is not hiring Mr. Morano from the beginning.

I hired Mr. Morano to get H1B visa which was granted in one month. However, he was supposed to do the paper works to bring my family in a couple of months, process that took about 15 months. I had to go back to my country and do the process myself. The experience of me to apply to the green card thro...ugh labor certification was awful: he let a paralegal or an assistant to fill out my case and made a huge mistake on the prevailing wage, reason why my case was denied. He not just hide the situation from me for very long time, but also was not really involve on fixing my case, leaving cases to beginners in his office. He is a nice person but the way he oversees things caused me to be forced to leave the country 4 years ago. Thanks Michael!! I lose a big opportunity, my moving was very expensive and my kids over here are not able to live in US.