Robins Kaplan Secures Asylum, Relative Petition for Somali Journalist

Robins Kaplan recently obtained approval of a relative petition for a pro bono client the firm has been representing for more than a decade. 

In 2010, through the firm’s work with the Advocates for Human Rights, Robins Kaplan attorneys began representing a Somali journalist who fled to the United States seeking asylum. He was escaping persecution from rebel groups and the Somali government as a result of his work as a journalist and his support for peace building, democracy, rule of law, women’s rights, and freedom of the press. While in Somalia, our client was detained by the government, received death threats, and saw friends and fellow journalists murdered or wounded in rebel attacks.

Through Robins Kaplan’s work, in 2012 our client was granted asylum. Next, our attorneys helped the client obtain travel documents and a green card and petitioned for his seven year old daughter to join him in the United States. That request was denied despite the fact that DNA testing conclusively established the relationship, our client regularly communicated with his daughter, provided financial support, and arranged for her to be cared for by family members. Robins Kaplan attorneys Austin Miller and Ellen Levish successfully appealed the unfavorable decision and obtained approval of the client’s relative petition for his daughter, clearing the way for her to join him in the United States.