Is he just marrying you for the green card?

A green card or immigrant status is considered a lifeline for some, so much so that there are those who will go to great extremes to get their hands on this ‘precious commodity’. It is not uncommon to hear women and men bemoaning the fact that they have been duped by fraudsters who wined and dined them and then changed completely once securing their love, a marriage certificate, and the assurance of permanent legal status abroad.

Even for those who are in perfectly good cross-border relationships, there is always the nagging concern as to whether the guy or girl of their dreams is just after a chance to live permanently in a foreign country, and cases reported in the media have not done much to allay these fears.

Last July, for example, the Daily Mail reported the case of UK charity worker Johnny Gannon, 58, who was left heartbroken after his Jamaican bride abandoned him just 20 minutes after stepping inside their matrimonial home. According to the Daily Mail, Gannon had spent thousands of dollars securing a visa for his then 24-year-old bride, after marrying her in Jamaica earlier that year.

Despite their 33-year-old age gap, Gannon fell madly in love with his Jamaican wife after a friend set them up on a blind date.

The couple dated for two years, during which time his girlfriend brought up the idea of marriage. He not only paid for her hair and wedding gown, but actually sent her 700 pounds to process her papers, and even more when she told him the cash had been stolen. For that year alone, he spent 4,000 pounds on her.

But upon taking her to his home in Perth, his wife stayed around long enough to run up a 500 pounds phone bill before bidding him goodbye. It is believed that she went to Bristol to meet her Jamaican boyfriend with whom she had organised the scheme.

“I had a vision of happiness laid out. I feel like a bit of a fool,” said Gannon, who later reported the matter to the police.

One woman identifying herself as an “American girl” who was not wanting to be used in the same manner as Gannon, asked All Woman recently for advice on how to know whether the Jamaican guy she is currently dating is as free, trustworthy and disengaged as he claims.

“I have been dating a wonderful Jamaican man for about a year. We have discussed our future together, marriage, location, finances, family. I do not want to be a fool or the other woman,” she wrote.

According to immigration consultant Denzil Taylor from Chit-Chat Immigration, you have to be “conscious, you can’t be gullible, because if you are gullible, then you are going to ignore some of the obvious signs”.

“Everything must be taken for what it is and you can’t just get information and accept it,” he said.

The immigration consultant pointed out that a partner’s friends and family could also be a great source of help at times.

“Sometimes you have to ask them open-ended questions, not pointed ones that would make them become suspicious,” he said.

Here are some of the signs Taylor suggests that would indicate that your guy or girl might be looking for a marriage of conveniencerather that the happily ever you are planning for both of you:

1. They don’t introduce you to any friends and family. If your mate is keeping you in hiding after more than a year of dating, it could be that he/she doesn’t want others to find out about you. Chances are that they don’t want anyone to slip and let it get out that they are already taken or are looking for just a business arrangement. If you are suspicious, suggest to your mate that you want to have a big wedding in Jamaica, with his/her friends and family around, and then gauge their attitude.

2. They are always asking you for money or things. After being with your mate for just a few months, you are kind of getting that feeling that you are a personal cash cow. You have to finance all of their trips to come to see you and still pay for your own when you go to see them. He/she does not ever seem to have enough credit to call you; he/she can’t email unless you buy them a computer; and they are always in-between jobs and want you to send them brand name clothes and shoes to go and seek work.

3. He/she is a habitual liar. They keep changing their story, such as telling you they don’t have any children, and connfessing the truth only after you run into the children while vacationing here. You are told they are the chief executive officer of their own company, but after months of dating, you’ve come to find out that they don’t even have a steady job. Then you are given one name, to discover another only after you accidentally find their driver’s licence. If your mate is lying about these things, then chances are they are also lying about their love for you.

4. He/she gets upset when you suggest you both live in Jamaica after tying the knot. You realise that your lover always gets upset whenever you suggest that both of you try and make life in Jamaica instead of living in your country. For them, you are basically putting a spoke in the wheel of their plans to live the charming life in another country.

5. Your new lover tries to rush you into marriage. You hardly know each other, but yet he/she has already settled on the perfect date for the wedding. There is no outward proof of his/her professed love and affection for you and instead of whispering words of affirmation to you, most of your conversations surround what will happen when the ‘papers’ come through. The conversation is always about status or green card. This attitude remains the same when you are vacationing here, although they refer to you as wife or husband.

6. Your friend tells you he/she is using you. It’s hard to see a person’s fault when you are blinded by love, but if your friends and family tell your that your mate is using you, then chances are that they probably might be. The least you could do is to assess what they have said.