He married me for a visa

[kikki]

I fell in love with a Jamaican man that I was introduced to by a mutual friend. I foolishly thought that he loved me and in the course of a four year relationship have given him over 100K. We have a son together that he does not bother to maintain and doesn't bother to see. He has two children in Jamaica and I have recently learnt one on the way with a woman from Nottingham. We are still married and I want to know if he is able to remain in the UK (he got indefinite leave to remain after one year of marriage to me). It seems very unfair that he would be able to bring his children to settle here from Jamaica when he has one child and another one the way and has left both mothers to be single parents.
If I get divorced can I get any maintenance out of him or retrieve some of my money?
He knowingly tricked me into marriage and encouraged me to become pregnant to make it look more convincing to the home office. He has lied and to Nottingham council that he is homeless an d they gave him a council flat, when there are several people in genuine need.
He has been let into Britain to cause mass destruction in the lives of innocent women and without a care in the world feels sure that he will not be made to go back to the life of poverty he led in Jamaica.
I have been used and abused and it seems there is nothing I can do. I have lived for the past 6 months in a women's refuge because of him and his abuse to myself and our son and yet he walks scot free.
I do not think that it is right that the home office can access the validity of a relationship after one year. They have now changed the ruling to two years but that is still not long enough for your partner to prove himself.
I was tricked into marriage and taken for a ride and I have no recourse.
Does anyone have any suggestions?

Hi, I am not having a great time at the moment, my ex is being a monster again and has stopped calling his son because I said that he can't see him if he is going to have him around other women and confuse him more than he is already. I don't want to run away because I do like some of my life here but I think that sometimes(mentally) there is not enough distance between us. What gets to me is that he doesn't seem to have any achilles heel. It doesn't seem to matter to him whether he sees his son or not. He came to the UK on a 6month visitors visa, met me got married and after one year he was granted indefinate leave to remain and it's like he grabbed it and ran. It really angers me because in the States he wouldn't have been able to get away with this as easily as he has done here. All he has to say is that I owe you nothing, you didn't pay my plane fare to come to England. The fact that I paid for him to visit Jamaica five times in two years, paid the rent in our home for the whole time we resided together and countless other things counts for nothing. I am not saying that he has stay married to me if he is not happy or that he is beholden to me for the rest of his life but the government are always taking about immigration problems and yet you don't even have to be an illegal immigrant in this country , all you have to do is marry a citzen for a year(two years now), work for a same length of time and then you are home free. I can appreciate that some people come and are trapped in awful/violent marriages but considering that he was the violent towards me and on an unsure footing, what difference does it make? I feel abused by him and abused by the system. I can't even go to America to be with my family as I do not qualify for any permanent residency visa there. Just fed up. Some people seem to slip through every loop hole there is and yet those of us who are honest and hard working hit a brick wall at every turn.

Hi Kiki, sorry about whats happened to you.
If you took your ds to America, do you think he would bother to pursue it?
If not I would be tempted to go for it.

what loophole has he slipped through? did he come to this country as an illegal immigrant? if he's come here legally then i don't see what loophole. my ex came here as an illegal immigrant, lived here for 10 years, then was granted indefinite leave to remain because the home office weren't sure what to do with him. he even went to prison whilst 'illegal' and they still let him out free.

You know you're going to have to stop being bitter about this and move on with your life. Don't worry about him, he will get his comeuppance.

I was in the same situation as you - marry him for love, he married me for a visa. We have a son together and he has not seen his son for over a year now. I have tried everything to get him to see his son, but he was not interested, in the end I left it.
Recently, I heard he was sacked from his high profile job due to fraud, his long term girlfriend left him and took their kids with her.

So move on and let him go, you have your child to spend all your energies on.

Take care hon.

kikki, I have skimmed the thread, and the following phrase from the OP jumped out at me

"I have lived for the past 6 months in a women's refuge because of him and his abuse to myself and our son and yet he walks scot free".

Have you contacted the police re the abuse?

Hi, I have contacted the police on four occasions and when I finally had the courage to press charges the CPS said their was not enough evidence(despite there being three witnesses). It was throughly pointless exercise.
Creole, that was very helpful message that you posted. At the moment it appears that my ex is having a great time and has the last laugh so to speak. It is hard as he has said that he does not want to see or talk to his son anymore and that we don't exist. I can't understand how he can be so nasty, our little boy is innocent in all of this. He has a child here that he doesn't bother with and yet he is free to bring two more into Britain regardless. If the reason for his stay was because he was in love and married and resided with a British citizen, then what is the reason now? What is he contributing to the country? He is on the dole at the moment, has got himself a council flat? I guess I must cut my losses and run. My son loves his Daddy dearly, its a shame the feeling is not mutal.

Hi dizzy bint
He came to the UK on a six months visiting visa and was scouting around for a victim as soon as he stepped off the plane. We married 4weeks before he was due to leave the country. I married cause I loved him and was pregnant and I thought he felt the same. The day his indefinate leave came through- one year and six months after being in Britain. The relationship started to career downhill. He was constantly out, constantly partying and spending what little money he earned on this lifestyle. He has no said that he was going out to find someone else as didn't want to be with me in the first place. As far as I am concerned if, the only way you can stay in the UK is to marry a citizen for a year and a half, then that's a loophole. How hard is that to prove you are an asset to the country?
He has all sorts of rights now and my son and I have none. He is on the dole and got himself a council flat, all within the space of four years in the U.K.
He has come to Britain for the easy life and since stepping off the plane he has been lying his way through the system very effectively ever since. He could not get away with this in America and that's why he targeted Britain. He has already been to Mexico and illegally crossed the border in the States. He didn't like America, as life was too hard there for him. So next stop was soft touch UK where you can marry a Brit for 5 minutes and be given the key the country. This just does not seem right to me. He didn't even have to prove that his marriage was geniune we sent off some wage slips and our birth certificates in 6 weeks he was granted indefinate stay.

If you divorce him before he is able to apply for permanent residence (ie after 2 yrs of marriage) he will not be allowed to stay or be naturalised.

Kikki - sorry to hear about your situation. I think that he will in fact be able to stay here if he has indefinite leave to remain.

I don't agree about having to "prove" your relationship to the Home Office with 2 years or more. I know plenty of foreign people who have been happily married for many years.

kiki read my first post again and please act on it choices are narrow for you this one isnt please try to forget this man and re-build your lives this is blunt but you really are 2nd in line ,you do have to create a home/loving and focused world for your child or you will regret it...do not bring your son up the wrong way...forget you ..remember him...cos your not now.

Hi cowmad, I have read your post again. I agree with what you are saying. I am focused on my son but I sometimes think that he needs a relationship with his father. He gets very attached to any man he comes into contact with i.e. friends boyfriends or the gas man etc. I have finally decided he is better off without his Dad, as he means neither of us any good.

I'm sorry - I've read the thread - but I can't get over the fact that you gave him 100k over 4yrs........that's 25k a YEAR!

Hi HRH
I was just a love sick fool. I was still realing after the death of my mother and had no one else around me for support. I'm sure he thought all his Christmases had come at once. A nice, naive young woman that's got a good job and a phat interitance with no parents or siblings to protect her. All my money went on his Jamaica charity and the idea was that we build a holiday home(by way of refurbishing his mothers house) out there for us to holiday to every year. He went out there five times in two years(I went once) to get passports and visa's for his two other children and he constantly wired money for one crisis or another, hurricane,family illness(they pay for med care like the US)etc. I was completely blind and between grief and PND it was all too easy for him to do as he pleased. It was actually 100K over two years. I only realise now that the cost of living in Jamaica, price of builders etc is not the same as the UK.At the end of the day anyone who has been tricked at the hands of a conman can understand how good they are.All I can do is admit how dumb I have been, try to get over the injustice of it all and get on with my life. My son is priceless.

Kikki, my family are from Jamaica and I have female relatives who have gone through what you have, despite being warned that it would end badly. My mother also has friends whose daughters have been duped by these charlatans. These guys are really convincing and once they get the visa, they show their true colours.

I'm sorry that you are going through this but my advice is to divorce this guy and move on. In the words of a black American writer whose name escapes me, "There is no there, there". Take your son, rebuild your life and hopefully,one day you will meet someone who is genuine and worthy of you, if that is what you want.

Thanks Speedymama, I was introduced to him by a friend of mine, she was married to his friend(now split too).I thought he was different, he doesn't look or dress like a typical Jamaican or even like his friends(garish colours,loads of jewellery and designer clothes) and I guess I thought he was different. In truth he is a product of his environment, where the vast majority leave a string of women and children dotted all over. Never mind, it's a life I am not used to and a life that I don't want for myself or my son.Thanks for your advice.