A federal lawsuit has been filed against a Dublin-based law firm that immigration lawyers say was a filing mill that defrauded dozens of immigrants.
Columbus-based immigration lawyer Inna Simakovsky said Monday that Angelyne Lisinski's firm filed cases for legal immigration status that used exaggerated stories of clients' experiences.
Simakovsky also said that Lisinski used a sales team to meet with clients. She says the Colorado-based plaintiff in the case, Eva Acevedo Ortega, never met with Lisinski.
"And again, that client has never met with Ms. Lisinski and most, all of the clients we've met with have never met her," Simakovsky said.
"There's one question: Have you met with these people, and have you reviewed their applications? You can't just rubber stamp these applications," Simakovsky said.
The suit claims that the Lisinski firm concealed from clients that their immigration petitions were self-petitions requiring allegations of domestic abuse or extreme cruelty, or applications that required allegations of forced labor or involuntary servitude, among other things.
The suit alleges that the firm delegated substantive legal work to non-attorney staff and used "non-attorney drafting personnel and template-driven processes to generate abuse narratives without meaningful client participation."
Simakovsky said Lisinski's firm charged clients $10,000 to $20,000 to file cases.
She said the class-action suit, filed this past Thursday in federal court in Columbus, asked for that money to be returned to clients.
In a statement, Lisinski said her firm strongly disputes the allegations, and that the firm has been built on a commitment to the highest ethical standards.
"We will not allow this filing to distract us from serving our clients or reaching our mission to change as many lives as possible," Lisinski said.
