Everybody in Huntington knew little Joey Neal, his father said. If he wasn't cutting the neighbors' lawns, he was delivering them newspapers or selling them hotdogs. He was an All-American boy and he grew up to be an All-American man, joining the Army when he was 18 years old.
Everybody in Huntington knew little Joey Neal, his father said. If he wasn't cutting the neighbors' lawns, he was delivering them newspapers or selling them hotdogs. He was an All-American boy and he grew up to be an All-American man, joining the Army when he was 18 years old.
Joseph Neal's patriotism ran deep, his father said, and so did his love for his Japanese wife and their son. He wanted nothing more than to provide them with a life in the country he loved.
But when Neal drowned mysteriously in the Ohio River in June 2006, not only did his wife, Miwa Neal, lose the man she loved, she also lost the American future he had planned for them.
One month before he died, Joseph Neal had filed Form I-130 with Citizenship and Immigration Services. An I-130 is a request for a foreign-born relative to be approved for lawful permanent resident status, also known as a green card. At the time of Neal's death, Miwa, and their son Liam, who is a U.S. citizen by birth, were living in Japan awaiting authorization to travel to and remain legally in the United States.
It wasn't easy being apart, Miwa said by phone from her parents' house near Fukuyama, Japan, but she had no other choice.
"When I married Joey I already had decided that until I died I was going to follow him," said Miwa. "If he wants to live in America then I want to live in America. If he wants to raise his son there, then so did I."
Seven months after her husband died, though, Miwa received more bad news.
"At first [immigration authorities] said they accepted my green card application," said Miwa, now 26. "Then one or two weeks later they sent me another letter that said something like, 'Your husband died. We got the death certificate. So we have to ask you to sign to cancel your green card.' I didn't know what I should do."
Neal's father, Jack, said he notified immigration services of his son's death through Rep. Nick Rahall's office in July 2006. In September of that year, Jack and his wife, Anna, who were co-sponsors on the original I-130, requested that they take their son's place as Miwa's living relatives in the United States. Three months after the Neals filed their request, Miwa received the approval letter from immigration services -- a week later, a rejection letter.
When Jack inquired with immigration services, they told him he must file a request asking to be substituted as sponsors.
"We informed USCIS that we had already made the request," Jack said by phone from the Neals' house just outside of Gainesville, Fla. Two years after Miwa received the letters from immigration services, Jack received another notice that the I-130 had been revoked because of the death of the petitioner.
"We were given 30 days to file a motion," Jack said.
In January, Jack filed the motion to reopen the petition and reconsider the decision based on humanitarian grounds, but it was denied shortly after. "The final notice stated that Miwa is not in the class eligible for humanitarian consideration," he said. The Neals are still appealing the decision.
Miwa is one of the more than 200 widows and widowers who have contacted Brent Renison, the pro bono counsel for the Oregon-based Surviving Spouses Against Deportation, since 2004. After their spouses died, so did their dreams for a life in the United States, as they were either deported to their home countries, or told by immigration authorities that they could not return to settle in America.
Living in America wasn't always Miwa's plan. In the spring of 2004 when she met Neal, she was a foreign student studying in the yearlong Learning English for Academic Purposes program at Marshall University in Huntington. Her plan was to spend a year learning English, and then return to Japan to complete her studies and find a job. That same semester though, Joseph Neal re-enrolled at Marshall as a sophomore after leaving school to serve in Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom in Iraq and Kuwait. When Neal resumed his studies at Marshall as an International Affairs major, he took a Japanese class, but struggled with learning the language, or so he told the teacher's assistant, Miwa.
Miwa tutored Neal for a month before he finally asked her out on a date. At first she resisted. She was going to be returning to Japan in May, and she didn't want to get attached, she said. But by the end of the semester, they had fallen in love and Neal had applied and been accepted to the study abroad program at Miwa's college in Osaka, Japan.
"He drove down to Florida and said 'Dad, I'm thinking about going over to Japan to study for a year,'" Jack said. "Of course I knew what that was all about."
By the time Neal arrived in Japan, Miwa had found them an apartment.
"One thing led to another and Miwa became pregnant," Jack said. "It was one of the happiest days of our lives."
In January 2005, Miwa and Joseph Neal were married and issued a United States marriage certificate through the United States embassy in Japan.
In the evenings, as a means of supporting his new family, Joseph Neal, who was 5 feet 7 inches tall, would ride what looked like a child's bicycle 14 miles to and from his job as an English teacher at the Kokusai Gaipo Center in Osaka. Joseph never complained, said Miwa, but she could tell he missed home.
Everybody in Huntington knew little Joey Neal, his father said. If he wasn't cutting the neighbors' lawns, he was delivering them newspapers or selling them hotdogs. He was an All-American boy and he grew up to be an All-American man, joining the Army when he was 18 years old.
Joseph Neal's patriotism ran deep, his father said, and so did his love for his Japanese wife and their son. He wanted nothing more than to provide them with a life in the country he loved.
But when Neal drowned mysteriously in the Ohio River in June 2006, not only did his wife, Miwa Neal, lose the man she loved, she also lost the American future he had planned for them.
One month before he died, Joseph Neal had filed Form I-130 with Citizenship and Immigration Services. An I-130 is a request for a foreign-born relative to be approved for lawful permanent resident status, also known as a green card. At the time of Neal's death, Miwa, and their son Liam, who is a U.S. citizen by birth, were living in Japan awaiting authorization to travel to and remain legally in the United States.
It wasn't easy being apart, Miwa said by phone from her parents' house near Fukuyama, Japan, but she had no other choice.
"When I married Joey I already had decided that until I died I was going to follow him," said Miwa. "If he wants to live in America then I want to live in America. If he wants to raise his son there, then so did I."
Seven months after her husband died, though, Miwa received more bad news.
"At first [immigration authorities] said they accepted my green card application," said Miwa, now 26. "Then one or two weeks later they sent me another letter that said something like, 'Your husband died. We got the death certificate. So we have to ask you to sign to cancel your green card.' I didn't know what I should do."
Neal's father, Jack, said he notified immigration services of his son's death through Rep. Nick Rahall's office in July 2006. In September of that year, Jack and his wife, Anna, who were co-sponsors on the original I-130, requested that they take their son's place as Miwa's living relatives in the United States. Three months after the Neals filed their request, Miwa received the approval letter from immigration services -- a week later, a rejection letter.
When Jack inquired with immigration services, they told him he must file a request asking to be substituted as sponsors.
"We informed USCIS that we had already made the request," Jack said by phone from the Neals' house just outside of Gainesville, Fla. Two years after Miwa received the letters from immigration services, Jack received another notice that the I-130 had been revoked because of the death of the petitioner.
"We were given 30 days to file a motion," Jack said.
In January, Jack filed the motion to reopen the petition and reconsider the decision based on humanitarian grounds, but it was denied shortly after. "The final notice stated that Miwa is not in the class eligible for humanitarian consideration," he said. The Neals are still appealing the decision.
Miwa is one of the more than 200 widows and widowers who have contacted Brent Renison, the pro bono counsel for the Oregon-based Surviving Spouses Against Deportation, since 2004. After their spouses died, so did their dreams for a life in the United States, as they were either deported to their home countries, or told by immigration authorities that they could not return to settle in America.
Living in America wasn't always Miwa's plan. In the spring of 2004 when she met Neal, she was a foreign student studying in the yearlong Learning English for Academic Purposes program at Marshall University in Huntington. Her plan was to spend a year learning English, and then return to Japan to complete her studies and find a job. That same semester though, Joseph Neal re-enrolled at Marshall as a sophomore after leaving school to serve in Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom in Iraq and Kuwait. When Neal resumed his studies at Marshall as an International Affairs major, he took a Japanese class, but struggled with learning the language, or so he told the teacher's assistant, Miwa.
Miwa tutored Neal for a month before he finally asked her out on a date. At first she resisted. She was going to be returning to Japan in May, and she didn't want to get attached, she said. But by the end of the semester, they had fallen in love and Neal had applied and been accepted to the study abroad program at Miwa's college in Osaka, Japan.
"He drove down to Florida and said 'Dad, I'm thinking about going over to Japan to study for a year,'" Jack said. "Of course I knew what that was all about."
By the time Neal arrived in Japan, Miwa had found them an apartment.
"One thing led to another and Miwa became pregnant," Jack said. "It was one of the happiest days of our lives."
In January 2005, Miwa and Joseph Neal were married and issued a United States marriage certificate through the United States embassy in Japan.
In the evenings, as a means of supporting his new family, Joseph Neal, who was 5 feet 7 inches tall, would ride what looked like a child's bicycle 14 miles to and from his job as an English teacher at the Kokusai Gaipo Center in Osaka. Joseph never complained, said Miwa, but she could tell he missed home.
"So I told him we can go back to America," Miwa said.
In January 2006, Joseph, Miwa, and Liam Neal returned to the United States and soon after Joseph found a job working as an Army recruiter in Memphis, Tenn. Miwa's 90-day tourist visa expired in April and she and Liam returned to Japan to await word on her residency request. Two months later, Miwa received the worst news of her life.
"The day he died I had a bad feeling, but I didn't know he was going to die," Miwa said.
That bad feeling has just gotten worse since her husband's sudden death. Miwa and Liam are still living with her parents and mentally ill sister, Toshie, who gets jealous of the young boy, said Miwa. Miwa's mother, Terue Takahashi, said Toshie is a threat to her grandson. "We are very afraid that [Toshie] may do physical harm to Miwa and Liam so I must keep watch," Takahashi wrote in a letter included in a motion appealing immigration service's decision.
Joseph's parents would be able to better provide for Miwa and Liam in the United States, wrote Takahashi. Since their son's death, the Neals have purchased a three-bedroom house in the same quiet subdivision about 20 miles east of Gainesville.
"When we stood at our son's graveside we promised him that we will provide Miwa and Liam what he was preparing to provide them," wrote Jack Neal in the same motion, which he filed on behalf of his son.
Chris Rhatigan, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, said that it is the job of immigration services officials to follow the law as directed by Congress, not to form opinions about it.
"Our position is the law," said Rhatigan, who added that she could not speak about individual immigration cases.
In January, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano ordered a review of the law, which opponents refer to as "the Widow Penalty."
"As a part of Secretary Napolitano's request, we are taking a very serious look at widows and widowers of U.S. Citizens," said Matt Chandler, a spokesman for the department.
Brent Renison of Surviving Spouses Against Deportation said his nonprofit organization is not advocating for the United States to grant residency to every widow or widower who continues to seek it after a spouse's death, but that the government should look at the cases more closely.
"All we're asking for is a case-by-case review," Renison said by phone.
While Miwa waits for a decision that may never come, she said she has not given up faith in living the dream her husband imagined for her and her son.
"After he died I just wanted to do what he wanted to do for me and his son," Miwa said. "He always said once we became parents, we think about our child first and wife or husband next, then last we think about ourself."
And when she looks at her son, she can't help but think of anyone but her Joey and his dream. He wanted to live in a small house in a quiet neighborhood close to nature and he wanted his boy to grow up playing sports and going to church on Sundays.
It was just a simple American life that doesn't seem so simple to Miwa anymore.
Lauren Nicole Mariacher is a graduate journalism student at Columbia University.
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