Topic: permanent residence
EDITORIAL – Permanent residence: The premier’s deepening quagmire
Premier Alden McLaughlin and his Progressives government spent $312,000 of taxpayers’ money to commission a report on a subject — the Cayman Islands’ permanent residence system — that affects every person living in, or thinking about moving to, this country. And he does not want you to read a word of it.
EDITORIAL – Permanent residence: Financial executive takes case to court
We cannot imagine the premier will be able to maintain his silence much longer on permanent residence applications. It will be the courts that will force him to obey the very laws that he and his government enacted.
Deadline passes for permanent residence FOI challenge
An immigration consultant’s report presented to government earlier this year which was the subject of an open records request by the Cayman Compass had not been given to the information commissioner’s office by the deadline of Friday, Dec. 2.
EDITORIAL: One PR applicant speaks out – We should listen
The Progressives legislators themselves created this permanent residence quagmire when they passed the immigration law, setting out specific requirements for people to obtain PR, inviting them to apply – and then refusing to follow the very law they wrote, approved and enacted.
Stuck in PR limbo
While my issues and worries may not be of any material concern to the political administration or Cayman constituents, it is because of their legislative commitment in October 2013 that my family is now in a position of grave uncertainty with regards to our careers, our ability to earn a livelihood … and the education of our children.
Permanent residence litigation
Permanent residence litigation — our editorial cartoon
EDITORIAL – Cayman deserves straight talk on permanent residence
We would hope Mr. McLaughlin would cease trying to reframe the government’s mounting problems with permanent residence applications as a “Compass vs. Government” matter. It is nothing of the sort. Permanent residence is an issue of great consequence to our entire country, and the Compass is simply pointing out the obvious: Our government must face it – and fix it.
Three-year immigration delay in residency case could cost government
The Cayman Islands government could be forced to pay damages following an immigration challenge filed by a local accountant who waited three years for his permanent residence application to be heard.
EDITORIAL – PR application delays: The consequences now loom larger
On today’s front page, in headline type so large that a legally blind patient taking an eye exam could read it, we share some extremely disconcerting news. It has to do with the risks the country is facing because of its inaction on more than 800 dormant permanent residence (PR) applications.
Jury returns 27 guilty verdicts in Cayman status trial
Paul Anthony Hume Ebanks was remanded in custody shortly before 1:30 p.m. on Tuesday following a series of guilty verdicts to 26 charges of obtaining property by deception and one charge of theft of a passport.
Jury in status scam trial told not to speculate
Justice Michael Wood began his summing up on Monday in the trial of Paul Anthony Hume Ebanks, who has pleaded not guilty to 27 counts of obtaining property by deception and one count of theft of a passport.
Judge to sum up Caymanian status scam trial
Justice Michael Wood is scheduled to begin summing up the evidence in the trial of Paul Anthony Hume Ebanks on Monday morning. He told jurors he planned to send them out to consider their verdicts on Tuesday morning. Trial began the week of Oct. 10, with Ebanks facing 27 charges of obtaining property by deception.
Permanent residence application
Permanent Residence application — our editorial cartoon
Defendant says status seekers threatened his life
Paul Anthony Hume Ebanks continued to take money from people by representing that it was for Caymanian status or permanent residence even after he suspected the offer was a scam, he told a court on Tuesday.
Cayman booming, but immigration issues unresolved, premier says
The Cayman Islands is “in a much better position” than the territory was four years ago, Premier Alden McLaughlin told a group of several hundred local businesspeople, with the development and tourism industry surging, unemployment down and a strong partnership between government and the private sector.
Recruiter says immigration status defendant ‘brainwashed us’
A woman who recruited people to pay $2,000 for status told the judge and jury on Tuesday that defendant Paul Anthony Hume Ebanks had “brainwashed” her and two other women into believing that everything about the scheme had to go through him because he was “their right-hand man.”
Payers believed Cayman status scheme was legitimate, jury hears
The first Crown witness completed her evidence on Friday in the trial of Paul Anthony Hume Ebanks, who has pleaded not guilty to obtaining property – over $167,000 – by falsely representing that various sums were required payments for legitimate grants of status or permanent residence or, in one case, the award of a government contract.
EDITORIAL – Permanent residence: A high price to pay for dawdle and delay
Our government’s deliberate inaction has put the country at great, and growing, risk of being taken to court, and losing – big time – with significant financial ramifications.
Lawyers: Immigration’s risk of human rights infringement growing ‘daily’
A myriad of legal difficulties arising in the determination of nearly 800 applications for permanent residence made by foreign nationals in the Cayman Islands has created a growing danger of human rights challenges against the government, a danger that is increasing on a “daily basis,” according to a review of the issues completed by a local law firm.
Immigration report on PR cost $312,000
The Cayman Islands government issued six checks totaling $312,470 for a consultant’s review of a 2015 Grand Court judgment that questioned the islands’ permanent residence approval and appeals process.
EDITORIAL – Is our premier the ‘dummy’ or the ventriloquist?
Perhaps Premier Alden McLaughlin is willing to play the role of the “dummy” — but we, and we presume the Caymanian people, are not.
EDITORIAL – Privy Council speaks; Cayman better listen
“Mr. Oliveira’s application for should have been concluded within 12 months from being made. Mr. Oliveira’s claim should be remitted to the trial...
Where does the buck stop on education failures?
Comments from CaymanCompass.com readers
Review of permanent residence system withheld
A government-commissioned review of the Cayman Islands permanent residence approval system, which was completed earlier this year, has been withheld from release by the Office of the Premier.
Nearly 800 PR applicants await decision
An estimated 793 applications for permanent residence in the Cayman Islands have been filed under the revised Immigration Law that took effect on Oct. 26, 2013, including 182 applications that were filed this year.
Response to Bovell article
I just read this article (“PR fiasco could harm real estate environment,” Cayman Compass, July 27) and many thoughts ran through my mind but all were book-ended with “self serving!”
Gov’t to end ‘paper shuffle’ by 2019
By the time non-Caymanian residents who stay in the islands at least eight years have applied for permanent residence, territorial citizenship and Caymanian status, they will have given a copy of their passport to immigration or to police at least a dozen times, assuming they are successful in each step of the application process.
EDITORIAL – The immigration report the premier doesn’t want you to read
The parts of Cayman’s permanent residence system have been arranged, rearranged and manipulated by officials like chess pieces on a chessboard.
Premier: Residency review ‘not intended’ for publication
A consultant’s review of the Cayman Islands Immigration Law completed earlier this year is “not intended” for publication, according to Premier Alden McLaughlin.
Women at center of landmark immigration case granted PR
Two women who applied for permanent residence nearly a decade ago were granted that status last week in a case in which Cayman’s chief justice ruled a “miscarriage of justice” had occurred.
Miller, McLean: No PR for Cayman’s ‘economic migrants’
Two independent opposition MLAs said they oppose granting permanent resident status to long-term Cayman Islands workers who do not have direct family connections to the islands, in comments made during budget debates over the past week.
Permanent residence scammers sentenced to prison terms
The promise of permanent residence in exchange for money was a “cynical exploitation of vulnerable victims,” Justice Charles Quin declared on Tuesday when he sentenced two women to prison for obtaining property by deception.
‘PR in principle’
Anyone who has been here for four years should have some indication on where they stand relative to their long-term tenure within these beloved Cayman Islands.
EDITORIAL – Absolute Zero: PR applications put in deep freeze
The Progressives government’s real immigration policy is to have zero immigration.
PR applicant misses deadline by one day
A permanent residence-seeker had his application to stay in the Cayman Islands for the rest of his life rejected because he missed the filling deadline by a single day, according to claims made in the Grand Court last month.
Women remanded for immigration scam
Two women are scheduled to be sentenced on March 8 for their roles in an immigration scam that led people to hand over $2,500 each in the belief that they would be granted permanent residence.
