Partner Visa Appeal at AAT Successful Due to Family Violence

Partner Visa Applicant’s Background

The Client met her ex-spouse online on a dating website. They only met once before their marriage.
Her ex-spouse traveled to India to visit her the first time and during this trip, he proposed to her.
They continued their long-distance relationship and began planning their wedding. A wedding ceremony was held in India on the second time they were physically together in India.
After their marriage, they both came back to Australia and our Client lodged a partner visa application.
Approximately, 5 months later, the Client’s marriage with her ex-spouse ceased as a result of family violence. She claimed that she suffered ongoing verbal, physical and psychological abuse and threats over the last few months of the relationship.
Her partner visa application was refused as the ex-spouse withdrew his sponsorship and the delegate was not satisfied that she was in a genuine relationship with her ex-spouse.
She appealed this decision to the Tribunal and sought our assistance.

To succeed in a claim of family violence, the delegate must first be satisfied that the visa applicant was in a genuine partner/spousal relationship with the Sponsor at the time of the family violence.
Secondly, only certain evidences of family violence are accepted. There are extremely strict rules.

Due to the short length of their relationship, there was only very limited evidence of their relationship. Moreover, due to the controlling nature of the relationship they did not take many photos, did not have a joint bank account, they rarely socialized outside of the household and she was confined to the house attending to the house chores.
In addition, she was no longer in contact with her ex-spouse so a lot of the evidence was no longer available.
We assisted her in her Tribunal case and we won by:
- Using case laws to argue her current case,
- Helped her build up the case based on existing evidence,
- Represented and assisted her at the Tribunal pointing out any anomalies or misunderstandings to the Tribunal Member immediately,
- Guided her in the types of evidence accepted as family violence evidence.