Immigration Attorneys Who Can Help

The attorneys at Wichmer & Groneck, LLC, have more than 65 years of experience handling complex immigration law matters for clients in St. Louis, throughout Missouri and across the world.

Case Studies

  • We take the tough cases — and win. Wichmer & Groneck, LLC, attorneys have successfully represented a broad range of clients in the field of business immigration, family and citizenship, political asylum, removal defense, criminal immigration issues and federal immigration litigation.
  • Tim Wichmer has been quoted on immigration issues in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, KMOX and KTRS radio, and on television interviews with KSDK, KMOV, KTVI, and KPLR.
  • In 2010, the firm successfully appealed a Board of Immigration Appeals (the “BIA”) decision denying an immigrant asylum, proving before the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals that the immigrant had suffered past persecution and had a well-founded fear of future persecution. Bracic v. Holder, 603 F.3d 1027 (8th Cir. 2010).
  • In 2008, Tim Wichmer won a landmark case before the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. The court agreed with Mr. Wichmer that it had jurisdiction to review the denial of a continuance by the BIA to allow an immigrant to apply for adjustment of status, and the court indeed found that the BIA had not provided a sufficient reason for its denial; as a result, the immigrant had the opportunity to become a lawful permanent resident of the U.S., rather than being deported. Ceta v. Mukasey, 535 F.3d 639 (7th Cir. 2008).
  • Tim Wichmer helped fight to keep an immigrant in the United States who had been persecuted by a communist government for professing the advantages of democracy there. Although the immigrant’s claim was initially denied by the immigration judge, Mr. Wichmer successfully argued the case orally before the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals — the court found that the immigrant had suffered past persecution as a matter of law and was entitled to withholding of removal. Sholla v. Gonzales, 492 F.3d 946 (8th Cir. 2007).
  • Tim Wichmer enabled an immigrant to adjust his status to that of permanent resident on the basis of his marriage to a U.S. citizen, despite the fact that the immigration judge had previously been civilly married to another U.S. citizen and the USCIS had originally deemed that marriage fraudulent. Osakwe v. Mukasey, 534 F.3d 977 (8th Cir. 2008).
  • Ashcroft Grants Asylum, Reverses AWO (PDF, 315K)
    In a decision dated February 13, 2004, attorney general John Ashcroft reversed a Board of Immigration Appeals opinion and granted asylum to a Wichmer & Groneck, LLC, client on account of imputed political opinion. This client helped save the lives of 14 U.S. Marines in the aftermath of the terrorist attack on the Marine barracks in Lebanon in 1983.
  • Eighth Circuit Finds IJ Curtailed Petitioner’s Testimony and Grants Asylum
    Mr. Wichmer represented an applicant for political asylum before the U.S. Court of Appeals after an immigration judge denied his asylum claim. The court ruled that the judge violated the immigrant’s constitutional right to due process of law and ordered a new hearing. This case is published as Al-Khouri v. Ashcroft, 362 F3d 461 (8th Cir. 2004).
  • Tim Wichmer is currently fighting an appeal on behalf of a business startup company challenging current USCIS interpretation of wage and profitability issues. He is also pursuing an appeal concerning issues of educational equivalency of foreign degrees.
  • Tim Wichmer successfully blocked a removal order from the Board of Immigration Appeals when the United States Court of Appeals held that his client was able to establish a bona fide marriage to her U.S. Citizen husband. This case set a new precedent on the type of documentation needed to establish marriage in good faith. Patel v. Ashcroft, 2004 WL1555183 C.A. 8 (2004)
  • Tim Wichmer represented an immigrant who was unlawfully detained by the INS because he was ordered removed due to country conditions which arose after his political asylum hearing. This lawsuit was successful, the immigrant was released, and this case was reported in the national immigration law reporter, Interpreter Releases, May 2001.
  • Tim Wichmer was able to help prevent the deportation of an immigrant who served in the United States Army by providing advice and expert testimony in a motion in the Missouri Circuit Court to set aside a plea made by the immigrant without knowledge of its immigration consequences.
  • In 2004, Tim Wichmer successfully argued that an immigrant who petitioned the courts to review her removal case should be able to stay her previously-granted period of voluntary departure. Rife vs. Ashcroft, 2004 WL 1496971 C.A. 8 (2004)
  • Tim Wichmer also successfully defended an immigrant who was lawfully present in the United States for 40 years, but who faced removal due to a criminal offense. After pursuing the client’s rights in immigration court, the U.S. Court of Appeals and the Missouri Court of Appeals, Mr. Wichmer was able to have the immigrant’s guilty pleas set aside and to have the removal proceedings terminated.
  • In 1999-2000, Tim Wichmer teamed with two family law attorneys in the Elian Gonzalez case in Miami, appearing in the federal court on his family’s behalf and successfully helping to reunite the boy and his father.
  • Wichmer & Groneck, LLC, attorneys have represented clients successfully in removal hearings on hundreds of occasions, obtaining cancellation of removal, adjustment of status, waivers of removal, political asylum, withholding, voluntary departure and other forms of relief.