Dr. Jeremy Sharp (00:01.218)
Hey folks, welcome back to the testing psychologist. I’m glad to be here with you in this new year of 2025. know this isn’t the first episode of 2025, but it’s the first one that I’m actually recording. So there we go. Hey, we are back. I’m back with a clinical episode and I’m back with a return guest. Dr. Mariella Shibley is here. She’s a clinical and forensic psychologist, psychoanalyst and expert in conducting immigration evals, which we will talk a lot about today.
She has a private practice in San Diego, California, where she also trains and supervises mental health professionals. Dr. Shibley is the founder of the online training program, Psych Eval Coach, which trains clinicians to conduct immigration evaluations. And she authored the book, Conducting Immigration Evaluations, a Practical Guide for Mental Health Professionals, published by Rutledge in 2022. That was also the topic of her previous podcast episode, discussing the process of writing a book. Additionally,
She serves as the director of mental health at the University of California, San Diego, student run free clinic and holds an adjunct faculty position at the California school of professional psychology. Her latest endeavor involves establishing a nonprofit organization to increase access to low or no cost immigration evaluations by training mental health providers and partnering with attorneys and legal nonprofits to facilitate these services to individuals in need. So.
As you can tell, Mariela is back today to talk about immigration evaluations. Now, we’ve talked about immigration evaluations before on the podcast, and she is back because I think this discussion is very timely given some of the changes and potential changes in our immigration system over the next months, days, or years. So we talk about how important
immigration evaluations are going to be in the next, in the foreseeable future. So Mariela talks about her personal experience as an immigrant and mental health professional. talk about a little bit of the historical context of immigration in the U S the current climate within immigrant communities. And of course we go into the various types of evaluations that might be needed for different immigration cases. We do talk through
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (02:22.062)
appropriate batteries and myths surrounding immigration evaluations. And the idea here is that you will have plenty to take away if you choose to go this route. There’s a real opportunity, I think, for clinicians to both provide helpful services to the immigrant community and expand their businesses. I will.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (03:03.8)
Now, before we get to our full conversation, I think at this point in time, there may be one or two spots left in each of the cohorts of my mastermind groups. So there’s a beginner group for folks starting out, an intermediate group, which I call the get your life back group for solo practitioners who are overwhelmed. And there’s an advanced group for group practice owners with larger practices. They start in early February. And like I said, there may be a spot or two left in each one. So if you’re interested, reach out.
testingpsychologist.com slash consulting. can schedule a call and we can talk about if it’s a good fit for you. But at this point in time, we are going to jump to my conversation with Dr. Mariela Shibley.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (00:01.378)
Mariela, hey, welcome back.
Mariela Shibley (00:03.579)
Thank you. Thank you. I like to be back.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (00:06.592)
Yeah, yeah, I’m glad to have you. We talked last time about your adventures in writing a book and now you’re back to talk about immigration evals, which is a timely topic right now.
Mariela Shibley (00:11.759)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (00:18.54)
Indeed.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (00:20.152)
Yes. Well, I will start with the question that I always start with, which is why this and why now, you know, why is this important? Why spend your time and energy life on this particular topic right now?
Mariela Shibley (00:33.707)
Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, as a mental health professional, my goal from the get-go was, you know, to help people and to improve their quality of life, right? And the way that I got involved in immigration evaluations was partly, you know, personal background. So I’m an immigrant myself and I was undocumented for a few years. And so I know what it’s like, you know, how hard it is, the whole process.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (00:58.734)
Hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (01:02.478)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (01:03.437)
And then also, so basically I got contacted by immigration attorneys who knew my husband who was an attorney and they asked me to do these evaluations. And the reason for that is because these evaluations can be so helpful for a client’s case. The issue is that the immigration system is quite biased. Okay. So it’s biased against
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (01:30.392)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (01:32.943)
the foreign nationals who want to settle, make a life, reside here lawfully. It’s very, very hard for someone who’s from another country to be able to get a green card to stay here, to visit even some countries, just to get a visa to come here can be really difficult. And the rules in many ways, they’re very arbitrary.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (01:50.42)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (01:59.427)
Right. So they say, well, you need to serve a penalty outside the country. need to leave the country for 10 years. Okay. Unless you can prove that a loved one will suffer extreme hardship. Okay. Well, what’s extreme hardship? What defines extreme? Right. There’s no, you know, no guide and no, you know. And so this is where we come in as evaluators. We try to bring a little more objectivity to this very subjective system with
objective data, opinions, facts that we can provide as mental health professionals. Have it, give it that psychological look at the situation, at the client, so that it can substantiate their claims, their cases.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (02:49.09)
That’s fair. fair. This might be a, don’t know if you know the answer to this question, but I’m just, as you, as you get into this topic, do you know much about the sort of the history of immigration here in the country? And I mean, has it always, has it always been sort of ambiguous and tough to go through this process or, you know, as a kind of ebbed and flowed over time?
Mariela Shibley (02:49.946)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (03:13.231)
That is so interesting that you bring that up. So I don’t know if I told you, but I did start writing a second book, which may not be published for a long time because I kind of put that on hold because I have so many things to do. But chapter one is already written and chapter one is exactly on that. It’s on the history of our immigration system. So I’m not going to like read the chapter, but I will tell you that, yes, it dates back many, years, but it’s always been inherently biased.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (03:18.958)
You did? Yes, yes.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (03:28.91)
Okay.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (03:41.582)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (03:42.967)
that they would ban groups of people, in particular Asians, were not allowed to enter the country. They were very discriminatory. The, you know, categorical. It was from the get-go biased against foreign nationals who didn’t, you know, fit the ideal.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (03:47.662)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (04:11.247)
of a U.S. resident in their mind.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (04:15.598)
I see. I see. And just to be super clear, mean, we’re talking about lawful and unlawful entry for lack of better term. that, is that right? Like, am I reading that?
Mariela Shibley (04:30.415)
Yeah, well, mean, Unlawful Entry only started really a few decades ago. Right? It was really hard to control that, you know, back in the day. God, I wish I could have… I don’t know, maybe this is kind of like off, but, you know, if I could have had like a summary of that chapter, I could have just like, you know, maybe give you a little more…
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (04:36.194)
Hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (04:54.862)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (04:58.681)
Maybe, I don’t know, we can do it some other time and like, patch it in. Know what I’m saying?
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (05:04.066)
Sure. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I know. It’s like a curveball question. I was just really curious.
Mariela Shibley (05:09.539)
No, but it’s so interesting and it’s so good. And I wasn’t, know, and I’m like, my God, right now it’s escaping my mind and I could give you some really good information there. Yeah, to answer that question, if you want to do it some other time or you me to record it and you can patch it in, whatever you want to do.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (05:19.822)
Sure. Hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (05:26.19)
Okay, okay. That’s cool. That’s cool. yeah, for now, let’s see, maybe we just trying to think where we left off. You said the unlawful immigration only became a thing a few decades ago. So maybe, I don’t know, maybe you just kind of jump back in with like a little summary statement. Like, so yes, it’s been biased for a long time or something, or it’s been hard for individuals for a long time.
Mariela Shibley (05:54.651)
Okay. So yeah, it’s been biased for a very long time. And with each administration, we see new trends. And now we have an upcoming administration where pretty much everybody’s frightened. Nobody knows what’s really gonna happen. There are some messages out there about what they anticipate will happen, whether that actually ends up happening or not, we don’t know.
I think a lot of these goals are somewhat unrealistic and impossible. But nonetheless, the fear is very real. The fear in these communities is palpable.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (06:29.58)
Hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (06:38.028)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I wanted to ask about that. mean, you know, I don’t want to turn this into a, a highly political discussion necessarily, but it’s hard to avoid that. mean, I am curious. Yeah. Like when you say there’s fear in these communities and obviously you work with, you know, these attorneys and folk, like, you know, lot of folks involved in, the community. can you say more just about the vibe and like what people are worried about and
what’s making its way around.
Mariela Shibley (07:08.663)
Yeah, well, so I mean, the message is basically they’re going to deport all people who are here undocumented, right? Which is a lot of people, a lot of people. And a lot of these people live in families where one or more family members are actually US citizens or lawful permanent residents. So this isn’t just affecting the foreign national and by any means, it’s affecting entire families, entire communities.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (07:18.68)
Right. Right.
Mariela Shibley (07:38.639)
this is your coworker or this is the person that you hire for help. These are teachers. mean, it’s everywhere. So I’m seeing kind of a repetition of what we saw in 2016. And so I work at a free clinic. It’s a UCSD free clinic that it’s staffed by
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (07:51.47)
course.
Mariela Shibley (08:07.611)
medical students and volunteers and pretty much all our patients are undocumented. They’re individuals who don’t have insurance and we provide their services free of charge. And what happened back in 2016 is people were afraid to leave their homes because there was literally border patrol circling around their neighborhood and just picking people up. And that happened.
That was real. And so a lot of people stopped working, stopped going to work. They wouldn’t come to the clinic. We had a support group. There was this thing about, you know, they were advised to not congregate in groups because, you know, they’d be easily targeted. And it was really, really sad because now they’re anxious, they’re afraid, they’re suffering, and they’re all alone. And yeah, yeah. So I anticipate
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (09:02.936)
It’s terrible.
Mariela Shibley (09:07.553)
something similar to that, unfortunately, at least at the beginning until we find out what’s going to happen. But it’s also the uncertainty. You don’t know if you’re going to be allowed to stay or not.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (09:13.87)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (09:20.522)
Sure, sure. mean, we all know the, I guess the stress of having like a huge, I think of it as like an unclosed loop in your mind. This huge question, uncertainty.
Mariela Shibley (09:28.899)
Right, right.
Yeah, because I mean, think of so, so a lot of people, there’s hundreds of thousands of people in the US who are here under temporary protected status, which is, you know, the government basically says because of the situation in your country, right, political upheaval or natural disaster or for whatever reason, you’re allowed to come and stay in the US temporarily until things get better. And these are
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (09:40.654)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (09:58.553)
you know, these are renewable, so they’re for a certain amount of time, and then they get renewed until the circumstances improve in their native countries. So what happens is that once a person, once that protective status is lifted, then all those people have to leave. And a lot of them have been living here for quite a few years. Perhaps they already have children who are born in the U.S.
Some of them were able to adjust their status to permanent resident, which is great, but some of them weren’t. And so now with this threat that they’re gonna terminate temporary protected status for a lot of these countries, you can imagine these families who are just like, well, I can’t make long-term goals. I don’t know what’s gonna happen. We can’t go back to our country. So where are we gonna go? So imagine that’s like a real source of stress that will keep you.
up at night that will permeate into every aspect of your life. And it really is going to take a toll on people’s mental health and physical health, unfortunately.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (11:09.192)
of course. mean, it’s unimaginable. Yeah, that’s terrible. It’s terrible. And then, so just to spell it out, I mean, how does that influence or impact our practice or the practice for clinicians who might offer these evals?
Mariela Shibley (11:25.723)
Yeah. So the evaluations can actually bring a little bit of that objectivity into this playing field. Right. Because they’re saying, well, in order to want to, you know, to stay, to avoid deportation, you can prove that a loved one who’s not just any loved one has to be say a spouse or child or a parent. In some situations, child, children don’t even count. They have to demonstrate that they would
suffer exceptional and extremely unusual hardship. That’s for it to avoid deportation. Okay. Can you define that for me what that is? Yeah. And they don’t have a clear definition other than, you know, something along the lines of like beyond what’s typically expected. Okay. Well, what’s typically expected? Explain that. So you see what I mean? It’s like, there’s very, it’s very up in the air. It’s very,
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (12:05.267)
Mm, it’s tough. Pretty vague.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (12:17.506)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (12:24.717)
up to their discretion. And so the more evidence that the applicant has to show this, that USCIS wants to see, the stronger their case is. what I anticipate, I mean, they’ve always been pretty critical of, they look at every piece of information, but I anticipate that with this new administration, they’re going to scrutinize everything.
that comes through their desks or that’s presented in court. so the more, the stronger their case is, the likelier they are to have a favorable outcome of their case. In other words, to be allowed to stay in the country.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (13:11.232)
Right. Right. Do you think, I mean, it stands to reason that there are going to be an increase in referrals for these evals or an increased need?
Mariela Shibley (13:22.211)
Yeah. And I’ve already started seeing it because, another issue is that we don’t know which programs are going to stay on or not. Right? So right now we have a program that’s called a provisional waiver that is, you know, for families who say one person’s married to a US citizen or lawful permanent resident, but they’ve been here unlawfully for a certain number of years in order to adjust their status. They need to waive.
this like ground of inadmissibility that’s called unlawful presence, meaning they were here unlawfully for a long time. The only way to waive that is if they can prove that their spouse or a parent, US citizen or lawful permanent resident would suffer extreme hardship if they had to separate or if they had to relocate. And you do that while you’re here in the US. Whereas a lot of these waivers, pardons, people are already separated.
So one person’s abroad, the other one’s here. So this came out in 2013, mainly to keep families together because these waivers were taking months, if not years, to get adjudicated. So in order to avoid that temporary family separation, they would apply for them here. So the families still stay together, apply, wait. Nowadays, it’s taking four years to adjudicate that waiver alone. Four years.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (14:21.954)
Okay.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (14:48.779)
my gosh.
Mariela Shibley (14:51.589)
four years of limbo of like, you don’t know what’s gonna happen. And then if that’s approved, then at that point, they can leave the country to go to their consular interview in their country of citizenship, which is your typical interview for the green card, right? Where they go and they’re asked questions and they verify that it’s a legitimate marriage, et cetera. And then luckily they come back unless they find…
another ground of inadmissibility. They bluff. They just make a mistake in their interview. They say something, I don’t know. So many reasons why they get denied. But at any rate, so that program, the provisional waiver, we don’t know if it’s going to stay or not. Nobody knows, really. So what’s happening now is
I’m getting flooded with referrals because attorneys are telling their clients, do it now, get it in, because even if they remove the program, they’re not going to cancel. Whoever’s already in is staying in that path. So let’s get it in as soon as you can. So we’ve seen a significant increase in referrals for that program, for example.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (15:53.221)
I see.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (16:02.51)
I see.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (16:11.542)
I see. Yeah. This might be a good time since we’ve already mentioned like a couple of sort of different circumstances, programs, waivers, et cetera, just to do a quick sort of overview of the different types of quote unquote immigration evals. because I, know, we hear this term and even for myself, I’m not an expert. I don’t think I could like tell you the different, the types with any accuracy. So that would probably be helpful here before we dive any deeper.
Mariela Shibley (16:26.531)
Uh-huh.
Mariela Shibley (16:39.269)
Sure, yeah. So I can start with those that I already mentioned, right? So the provisional waiver or the waiver for that matter where the person that you’re evaluating is not actually the foreign national. It’s a US citizen or a lawful permanent resident who’s coming in who needs to demonstrate to USCIS that they would suffer extreme hardship if they were to be separated or if they had to live abroad in order to stay together with her loved one.
And so, those people will come to us and we do a very thorough evaluation where, again, what’s tricky about those evaluations is we’re speculating, right? Because they haven’t been, they’re not separated already. So this isn’t about like how you’re doing right now. It’s about based on how you’re doing right now, based on your history, your personality characteristics, the quality of your…
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (17:26.253)
Right.
Mariela Shibley (17:35.995)
emotional bonds with your loved ones. We can sort of anticipate how you will fare in the face of a separation from this person who, again, also needs to demonstrate what they mean to you. Are they like your main source of support system? You have already a family that’s built around perhaps like specific roles. So one’s the breadwinner, the other one’s in charge of the family. So like what would happen if one of…
The two has to leave. So those are the waiver or some people call them hardship waiver evaluations. Similarly, we have the cancellation of removal, which is pretty much the same referral question, right? What would happen if they had to separate? The difference is here they’re not separating for 10 years, they’re separating forever. If they’re deported, they’re not allowed back. This isn’t a temporary ban as with the other types.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (18:14.658)
Yes. Yes.
Mariela Shibley (18:34.587)
So, and the bar is set much higher in terms of what they need to prove for their suffering. But for us, it’s the exact same thing, right? In terms of the valuation, we’re evaluating the US resident, US citizen. There are some cases where we’ll actually evaluate the foreign national, but those are more specific in terms of what the referral question is. So it would be for cancellation or removal, but it’s something more specific, like rehabilitation or anything like that.
And then you’ve got all the evaluations for cases of immigration relief. So for example, asylum, people who are applying for asylum, that’s another thing. We don’t know what’s going to happen with asylum. Come with this new administration, we don’t know what the requirements are going to be, if they’re going to even allow it. We really don’t know. And there’s different types of asylum cases.
And so in that case, of course, we’re evaluating the foreign national. with asylum, for example, I mean, it could vary. It could be to document the harm that they suffered as part of the persecution in their country of origin, right? Because that’s why they grant asylum, if they need to prove that they suffered persecution or they fear future persecution in part of the government or a group that the government is unable or unwilling to control.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (19:50.029)
Yes.
Mariela Shibley (20:03.983)
and that’s based on a number of like race, gender, sexual orientation, et cetera, right? So in those cases, you are evaluating the foreign national, but the purpose of the evaluation might be to assess issues around credibility. So not so much about the harm they sustained, but perhaps there were some inconsistencies in their testimony.
because a lot of these are handled in court. There were some things that perhaps the judge or the government attorney didn’t find them credible. so, like I had one recently where they said, well, every time he talked about it, he laughed. And so they interpreted that as like, he thinks it’s funny. I’m thinking, well, right, exactly. So it takes a mental health professional to be able to explain like, no, this is what happens when somebody’s recalling a trauma that’s really uncomfortable.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (20:51.417)
gosh.
Yeah.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (20:59.106)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (21:02.341)
Sometimes this anxiety gets manifested in nervous laughter. That has nothing to do with something being funny or not funny, right? And then there’s other things like, for asylum, you need to apply within the first year of arriving to the country. So some people couldn’t do that. And so they need to demonstrate that there was a valid reason. It’s more specific, but I’m just summarizing it, that there was a valid reason that they didn’t apply.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (21:11.683)
course.
Mariela Shibley (21:32.119)
on time so we can explain that from a mental health perspective. Then you have evaluate victims of crimes that occurred in the US. Those are called UVSUS, victims of domestic violence under VAWA. Wow, I’m having a glitch, a mental glitch.
Violence Against Women Act, sorry, wow. Violence Against Women Act, yeah. Which actually, I mean, it says women, but it applies equally to men and women and same sex relationships, marriages and not. So for those, again, we’re evaluating the foreign national who needs to substantiate their claim that they were victims of extreme cruelty at the hands of their spouse, their US citizen or.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (22:05.718)
Sure.
Mariela Shibley (22:31.855)
lawful permanent resident spouse.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (22:34.062)
I see. I see.
Mariela Shibley (22:35.515)
Yeah, and then lastly, I mean, we have T visas. T visas are very, very popular recently. They changed the regulations last year. Yeah, and so they made it slightly easier, I think, for people to qualify for a T visa. It’s for victims of human trafficking. And what’s interesting is that, so like, U visas, for example, they have a cap of 10,000 per year. So there is a wait list of…
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (22:41.526)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (23:03.429)
I don’t know, think over 10, 15 years now because they always meet that cap really quickly. But with TV says the cap is 5,000 a year and as of now, they’ve never met that cap. So that’s why they changed the regulations. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So now all these attorneys are like flooding, like they’re just saying, you qualify, let’s do this right now. Let’s get in, you know, before the waiting list develops and grows and grows.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (23:16.077)
Okay.
thing.
Mariela Shibley (23:33.637)
So I think that’s another reason why we’ve been getting a lot of requests for those. And each evaluation is quite different in terms of what you need to focus on and what you need to be mindful of. So you could include certain details that might seem innocuous to you as an evaluator, but that could actually really jeopardize a client’s case.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (23:46.648)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (23:58.402)
Hmm. Can you think of an example right off hand where we might be doing the best that we, that we can and inadvertently put someone in jeopardy?
Mariela Shibley (24:08.281)
Yeah, so for example, you are trying to show how much a person suffered, right, as a result of, say, this intimate partner violence or a crime, et cetera. And the person discloses to you that they’ve had suicidal thoughts. No plan or intent, but just sort of like passive suicidal ideation. And you would think that’s great because that strengthens the report, right? It shows how much they’re suffering.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (24:38.382)
Yeah.
Mariela Shibley (24:38.435)
Well, it just so happens that if you mention suicide in a report to USCIS, that’s going to trigger a need for clearance. They’re going to have to prove that they’re not a danger to themselves or others to immigration. So they’re going to get a letter, a request for more evidence, but says, the doctor here saying that you’re having thoughts of suicide. You need to prove to us that you’re not going to kill yourself.
So very innocuous, very standard that you’re like, yeah, the more the better, right? In terms of how we demonstrate how they’re doing. And something like that could really jeopardize a client’s case at worst. It could also happen that the attorney catches it and says, no, no, you can’t say that. And then they say that to the evaluator. The evaluator’s like, I’m sorry, I wrote it. It’s what I wrote. It’s what I had to do.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (25:12.983)
Right.
Mariela Shibley (25:36.515)
And so the attorney is going to say, OK, well, thank you. Then we’re not going to use the report because we’re not going to jeopardize the client’s case. So then this client came in, spent a bunch of time, and was hopeful about this helping. And they’re not even going to use it. And the attorney is never going to refer a case to you again. So this is why it’s so important to know these little intricacies. immigration law.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (25:36.718)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (25:40.679)
God.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (25:56.918)
Okay, good to know.
Mariela Shibley (26:04.917)
is the second most complex law in the country after tax law because it changes all the time. It’s constantly changing. And so people need to keep up to date with the recent trends with regulations so that we don’t make these mistakes unknowingly.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (26:24.174)
Of course, of course. mean, out of all the types of evals that you mentioned, at this point, which ones do you feel like are the most in need or most in demand, most popular, if you wanna think of it that way, it’s kind of a funny, yeah.
Mariela Shibley (26:38.273)
Yeah, yeah. mean, it kind of, it depends on sort of the referral sources, right? So if you’re getting referrals from a legal nonprofit, you might get a lot of asylum requests, right? But if you, I think for the most part in general, and I would have to, I don’t even know if they have these statistics, but in my experience working,
you know, about 17 years doing these evaluations. It’s the waivers that are the most popular because there are so many grounds of inadmissibility. There’s so many reasons why the government will say you’re not allowed to stay or to enter the country and you need to, you know, cure those grounds of inadmissibility by proving certain things. And cancellation of removal.
So what I anticipate now is cancellation of removal out, you know, like up to the roof, for sure. For sure.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (27:41.794)
make sense. Okay. Maybe we dive into those. Yeah. I think it would be helpful to, to provide some details, talk about what those look like, how to do, how to do a good eval, things like that. yeah, yeah. So we’re.
Mariela Shibley (27:55.617)
Yeah, So for most of the… So for cancellation or removal, they need to prove this hardship to a qualifying relative. And that relative has to be either a son or daughter or a spouse or a parent, all of whom are US residents or lawful permanent residents and US citizens.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (28:12.046)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (28:24.571)
And so what I get a lot is children. I get a lot of children referrals because they’re more, I mean, it’s quite easy to prove that a child will suffer if you remove their parent, know, believe it or not. I’m being sarcastic. It’s ridiculous that they need that. And so what I anticipate is that we’re going to be seeing a lot of
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (28:41.42)
Makes sense. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Of course.
Mariela Shibley (28:54.361)
these cases.
I forgot your question. about what these cases are like.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (29:03.374)
Yeah, just kind of diving a little deeper into what these evals look like, how to do them well, characteristics, details that we might need to know as practitioners if folks are out there like, hey, I’ve done a couple of these. I want to do more. Or, I see this huge need and opportunity. How do I get into that? Yeah. Yeah.
Mariela Shibley (29:17.304)
Right, right, right, right, yeah, yeah, yeah. So we are used to, know, there’s a lot of different types of mental health assessments that we do, right? And perhaps we’re used to going for a diagnosis and prognosis and recommendations. And in these immigration cases, sometimes the diagnosis is not as important.
Or let me phrase it a different way. It’s very important if there is one, but sometimes there isn’t one. So you’re evaluating a child, right, who’s happy-go-lucky. Parents are shielding them from what’s going on politically and with their immigration status. And they may not be at least consciously aware of what’s going on. So.
A child is not particularly anxious just yet. So they’re not going to meet criteria for a diagnosis. But there is so much you can say about this child if you start looking into like their attachment style, their history, like they had separation anxiety when they were little. All right, well, that’s a very good predictor for decompensating emotionally, more so than like they like to say the average person.
right, if they were separated from a parent. So is really being able to focus on the referral question and honing in on that without adding extra information that’s unnecessary, and that can cause these potential pitfalls that can really jeopardize a case.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (30:42.904)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (31:09.954)
course.
Mariela Shibley (31:11.259)
So yeah, I don’t know how much deeper you want me to go into.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (31:14.22)
Yeah. Yeah. Well, maybe we take a, like a big picture overview of what this, what does the eval process look like? So you get the referral, from the attorney presumably, and they say, don’t know, what do they say? Yeah.
Mariela Shibley (31:31.203)
Yeah, sure. Yeah, yeah. Well, first of all, it’s unlikely that you’ll get the call from the attorney. So, yeah, so typically the client here is a person that’s coming in to see you. It’s right. And so the attorney referred them to you. But they’re the ones who are calling to schedule an appointment, and a lot of them don’t really understand. They don’t really know what it is that they need. So.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (31:37.633)
Okay.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (31:42.476)
Okay. Yeah.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (31:55.739)
For instance, I have an office manager here and she is very well trained on all the different types of evaluations because she has to discern over the phone what type of evaluation they need. Is it for a VAWA? Is it for a cancellation of removal? Is it for a UV set? So she needs to know to ask the right questions because clients oftentimes have no idea. And they will say, I don’t know, my attorney told me to call it and I need a letter. Well, it’s not really a letter, it’s a report.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (32:24.895)
Right, right.
Mariela Shibley (32:26.327)
Right. And so once you figure out what type of case this is for, if it sounds weird and complicated, we end up calling the attorney and asking clarifying questions. Like, what exactly do you want me to evaluate here? But that’s not the norm. These attorneys have hundreds and hundreds of cases going at the same time. And they usually have sort of like a sheet with checkboxes. These are all the things that you need to get me, your fingerprints, your documents, your blah, blah.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (32:40.483)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (32:56.107)
and psychological evaluation, here’s the number, here’s the list of numbers to call and schedule it, right? So they would come in and I have them do a bunch of different questionnaires, tests and questionnaires, pencil and paper here in the office because I like to go over them with them afterwards. So I like them to be done ahead of time before the interview. So they will do those. Yeah?
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (33:24.494)
Okay. Great. Yeah, I was just clarifying the process. So the, this is happening before the intake, so to speak, or the interview.
Mariela Shibley (33:30.811)
Exactly. they come in and this is the first thing that they will do. So in addition to their consent forms and et cetera, they will do like a symptoms checklist. A lot of people use Beck inventories or the CL90, whatever it is that you want to use. We all have our preferences. so it’s not overwhelming by any means.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (33:53.912)
Yes.
Mariela Shibley (33:59.555)
Of course, we have them in whatever languages they come in, and those are the ones that we use, meaning we don’t translate forms, tests that are not originally in that language. And I say that because, again, we’re evaluating, even in the cases where it’s a lawful permanent resident or a naturalized citizen, oftentimes they are immigrants themselves who just happen to adjust their status.
and they might prefer their native language. So we do those. And then they would come in for the interview, which is around two hours long, depending on the case. And it’s very focused on what’s going to be on the report, because otherwise you would be here for hours on end. So for instance, I’m not asking a lot of questions about their educational history.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (34:32.462)
Make sense.
Mariela Shibley (34:57.37)
right, and how they did and what was their favorite subject and what, know, you don’t even go near there. It’s so irrelevant, right? So, again, so that’s the interview. You want to really have the referral question be the guide. How am going to answer this referral question? What do I need? it’s one thing to, I think some people look at it as like everything’s coming from the patient, from the client.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (34:57.676)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (35:03.778)
Yes, yes.
Mariela Shibley (35:27.321)
Right? They have all the information. I’m just going to sort of organize it. And the reason they come to us, mental health professionals, is because we can do a lot more than just regurgitate what the client is saying. Right? Or even translate it into some jargon. We can look beyond. We can connect the dots. We can say this person has this background. So that sort of predisposed them.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (35:46.114)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (35:56.335)
to suffering later on. In particular, they have a propensity to compensate when they’re feeling abandoned or distant from a loved one. And that is super relevant to the referral question. Or a person, this person, you know, they’re telling you stories about their childhood. Now, what they say in the interview, they give me a lot of information, but what I end up writing in the report is, you know, it’s more concrete, it’s more specific, right?
But they might tell me, know, give me these instances of how, you know, when they were little, a kid, you know, stole something, saw their lunch and they complained and then they were the ones to get in trouble. And so from then on, they never, you know, spoke up for themselves again, because they knew that they would be the ones to get in trouble. And now that person here is, is a victim of trafficking, right? And so you’re trying to explain how this impacted them and it’s
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (36:24.962)
Yes.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (36:47.768)
Yeah.
Mariela Shibley (36:54.747)
So you can go back and connect the dots and say, this is the person who early on in life learned that speaking up for themselves was not only not going to do them any good, it could actually get them in trouble. So if your referral question is like, well, why didn’t they report this to the authorities? Well, here’s why. Right? And that’s not something that if I were to ask the client, why didn’t you report it? And they’re going to say, because when I was little, this happened. They don’t make that connection. Right?
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (37:21.64)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course, of course.
Mariela Shibley (37:23.813)
So it’s for us to really, these questions that might seem, you know, just not that relevant perhaps to the client. Like, why are you asking me about my childhood if what we’re here to talk about is what this person did to me, you know, two years ago? Then that’s why they come to us, the mental health professionals who know how to understand this.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (37:35.554)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (37:44.47)
Yeah, so I’m gonna.
Sure, sure. This is a different flavor than I was anticipating, think, with these evals. It’s super interesting. The question that’s coming up for me, I’ll try to ask it in the right way, it seems, just hearing you describe it, it almost sounds, I mean, it sounds hard. It sounds hard because you’re really looking pretty deeply and making connections that may or may not be obvious. I mean, certainly in this case of the…
Mariela Shibley (38:13.082)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (38:17.196)
you those specific evals, you’re sort of like projecting forward and guessing what someone might feel like that. I mean, that just feels hard. don’t know. I’m curious how it, how it, how it feels for you or if I’m off on
Mariela Shibley (38:31.195)
Sure, yeah. Well, to me, at this point, it feels very second nature. And I might add that I think I have sort of the extra help of the fact that I’m a psychoanalyst. so, for me, connecting the dots and the past and the unconscious is something that I’m very keen on. But…
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (38:38.19)
Mmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (38:48.343)
Yes.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (38:53.55)
I see.
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (38:59.139)
I think what’s really hard, to be honest, is staying objective and neutral, which is so important because here I am saying the US immigration system is biased. Okay. Well, I can’t be biased. I’m the one who brings the objectivity to the playing field. Right. I’m the one who’s saying, yes, it is hard. It is hard, but it’s so, so
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (39:07.032)
see that.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (39:13.261)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (39:18.136)
Mm-hmm.
Seems very hard.
Mariela Shibley (39:27.745)
meaningful, so important for these cases. I can talk about, you know, I have research to back me up. We, you know, we went to school for this. The officer reading the report didn’t. And so we’re educating them in a way, but, you know, very tactfully, right? And in a way that we don’t come across as advocates, because if you come across as an advocate, then the report loses its weight.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (39:29.688)
Hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (39:45.358)
course.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (39:55.384)
How do you do that? That seems very challenging.
Mariela Shibley (39:57.987)
It is challenging. And it’s something that I’m constantly working on. That’s part of the, what I do is I’m constantly in communication with immigration attorneys. go to like ALA conferences, which is the American Immigration Lawyers Association to learn about new trends and what’s happening. And so just to give you one example, we had an in-house.
training from an immigration attorney on TV sets just because they’re so new and we’re trying to really do a good job. And she explained to us why it’s so important to not put so much background information on these reports, to not describe the trafficking in detail, which might be counterintuitive, right? Exactly. But she had a very valid explanation. I’m explaining it.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (40:47.8)
does seem counterintuitive.
Mariela Shibley (40:53.221)
The client is writing it in their declaration. We have other evidence. We don’t need you to repeat it, right? Especially if that’s going to open the door to inconsistencies, because they will latch on to any inconsistency to basically say, like, were you lying then or are you lying now? Right? That’s sort of the attitude. So the important thing, the reason we come to you is not for you to tell what happened, but to talk about how it impacted the person.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (41:12.184)
Yes. Yes.
Mariela Shibley (41:21.487)
that only you as a mental health professional can do. You can have that perspective.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (41:28.51)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I’m just, yeah, I think I’m just noticing like the maybe admiration and respect for clinicians, you know, who do this. Because it just seems like that takes so much self-awareness and monitoring because, I mean, as human nature, like what I’m gathering from the way you describe this is like the USCIS, right, is like their
Mariela Shibley (41:38.779)
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (41:56.236)
their vibe, so to speak, is to be pretty, detail oriented. They scrutinize and they’re not coming at this from place of like help trying to help people really, you know, it’s like, how can we screen out these individuals and like, you know, get them out of the country. And so I think it’s human nature to want to like push against that, you know, and like do a counterbalancing kind of, kind of approach, but
Mariela Shibley (42:13.07)
Exactly. Right.
Mariela Shibley (42:19.226)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (42:24.14)
You just said like, if we come across as too much of an advocate, that’s going to set off alarm bells as well. Yeah.
Mariela Shibley (42:29.847)
Exactly. Exactly. They’ll say that you’re biased. And, you know, how do we know you’re not exaggerating? And how do you know that, you how do we know that you took everything into consideration? And a lot of these cases are not adjudicated in court. They’re decided administratively. So you never get to talk to the adjudicator. The client never gets to talk to the adjudicator. It’s all paperwork. So
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (42:34.541)
Yes.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (42:40.856)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (42:51.661)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (42:58.936)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (42:59.513)
You really have to get your point across. Like one thing that I always say is like, you need to be two steps ahead. You need to, you know, think like the reader and think what is a reader going to argue? Like, yes, but, right? And address it. Like jump right into it and address it before they have that argument that might at best elicit a request for more evidence, which just delays the whole process and costs more money.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (43:13.218)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (43:21.859)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (43:28.707)
And at worst, they can just decide against the case.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (43:29.176)
I see.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (43:33.356)
Right, right. You know, this situation, these evals seem like they are also just sort of rife for our own biases, right? mean like confirmation bias, mainly like, you know, the individuals are coming in and like you want to be an, you want to be an advocate, you want to be helpful. So the, I guess I’m curious how, yeah, how you work at
Mariela Shibley (43:44.196)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (43:53.518)
Yeah.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (44:02.446)
against that as well. It’s kind of a similar question, you know, to how do you stay objective? I wonder, like, does anyone come in and you actually say, well, I don’t see any hardship here. I don’t, I don’t see any evidence for that.
Mariela Shibley (44:12.623)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, mean, thankfully they’re properly screened, the attorneys that we work with. Like I created this like screener that they can give to their clients to see if they would benefit from a psych evaluation. And so some of them actually give it to them. So, and they know that it costs money and it takes time. I mean, and if attorneys are sending them, they’re usually like, you know, pretty good attorneys who know that a psych evaluation would help. So,
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (44:43.799)
soon.
Mariela Shibley (44:44.365)
It’s not as common as you would think, but it is. a matter of fact, we had one yesterday, one of my clinicians called me and she’s like, I don’t know what to do. This guy is a total pro-Trump-er who’s saying like they need to build a wall and keep everybody outside except for his wife. And she went on rant for 45 minutes and it was like, wow. Okay, well we can talk about it. So I don’t have any more details about it, but I don’t know how good of a case this might be. And then in that case, we might just end up.
either not writing the report and of course telling them that it’s not going to be in their favor. Or we might just kind of shift gears and that instead of addressing that referral question, we might turn it into a psychodiagnostic evaluation and let the attorney use it however they want to use it, right? So if we’re diagnosing this person, you know, suffers from anxiety and they need treatment and, you know, this is what’s going to happen if they don’t get treatment or whatever it is, right, that they want us to do.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (45:19.64)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (45:42.669)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (45:43.887)
and then let the attorney work their skills into fitting it in and making it helpful for their case. That’s not our job, right? The attorneys are the ones who know what to do. But for the most part, there’s very little, you’d be surprised because there’s so much secondary gain, but there’s very little malingering in this population. There’s some exaggeration, but again, we need to understand it. The exaggeration is from a place of desperation.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (45:55.021)
Yes.
Mariela Shibley (46:13.433)
Because again, this is so unfair. How do I prove to you that this is going to hurt me, to ruin my life in some cases? So we need to look beyond that and not say, well, he exaggerated, he was malingering. There’s not even need to mention that because you understand what that means. And you can look beyond. That’s why all the self-report measures and stuff, yeah, they add that.
quote unquote objective evidence. There’s nothing objective about a self-report measure, but it looks good on paper, right? But ultimately it’s your own clinical judgment in having years of working with human beings and understanding how their minds work, how their defenses pop up, how they react in the face of fear, in the face of uncertainty.
in the aftermath of trauma, et cetera.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (47:14.444)
Yes. Yes. So we haven’t talked much about the battery. You bring up self-report measures. We talked about the interview, you know, the pre sort of the consult and then the interview and then, what does the actual testing look like or just, or the assessment process?
Mariela Shibley (47:21.882)
Mm.
Mariela Shibley (47:33.155)
Right, so everybody’s different. Some people don’t, I think some people don’t do any testing at all. I like, so, depends for the type of case, right? In general, I do, you know, like the SCID, right? The semi-structured clinical interview for DSM-5 disorders, which, you know, I sort of have a system where I give them a questionnaire of symptoms that I developed, that I came up with.
And then based on their answers to that, then during the interview, I ask them more follow-up questions to get to the root of it. So you’re saying, I’m feeling sad. Well, tell me more about that sadness. Is it more days than not? It’s like all the flow chart of the skit interview. I also give them an attachment measure to assess their attachment style in cases where it’s about the relationship.
I like the projective testing because again, because of my background, so I like the sentence completion. And you’d be surprised, I get so much from those responses. Just reading through, I notice some themes, I see what’s important to them, what their values are. Now, of course, you’re not going to base any conclusions on any one test and no test is going to, you know, sort of taint the rest of the information that you have.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (48:42.017)
I believe it.
Mariela Shibley (48:59.855)
So you take it all in the aggregate, right? And you look at it qualitatively as well. Are they second guessing themselves a lot? Yeah, it says nothing about what they’re writing on the actual questionnaire, but it tells me something about them as a person, their personality, right? So in the quote unquote, bigger tests, I like the PAI, the personality assessment instrument, because
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (49:19.064)
Yes.
Mariela Shibley (49:28.889)
It talks about more about their strengths or weaknesses, their ways of relating with others. I find it to be quite accurate. I’ve tried, I’ve done others, but for instance, like the MCMI, you know, because it was normed in a clinical population, it tends to over pathologize or to accuse people of like minimizing denying when they’re totally okay. So, and the PAI doesn’t really do that.
So that’s one that I really like. If I’m assessing trauma, the TSI, the Trauma Symptom Inventory 2, I really like that one because again, and both of those have validity scales as well that make them a lot more objective. And yeah, I really like that one because it goes beyond just symptoms, right? It talks about how they cope, how they see themselves, et cetera. So those are, think, the two.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (50:04.312)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (50:27.663)
biggest ones, the longest ones that we give, would say. And then I didn’t say, so it ends, actually doesn’t end with the interview, then we write the report. But for that, then the clients, you know, when they leave and then we write the report. You know, I always follow sort of the same, same format. That’s just the stylization, right? There isn’t one way to write it.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (50:32.334)
Yeah, yeah, fantastic.
Mariela Shibley (50:55.075)
And then we can either send it to the client or they can sign a release and we send it directly to the attorney, which 99 % of people prefer that just because, you know, they want to keep it all together in one place. I don’t know, they just prefer that.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (51:12.098)
Sure. That makes sense to me. Yeah. So this is all happening essentially in one or two days. And then you write the report.
Mariela Shibley (51:19.833)
Yeah, so people vary here. Some people like to have separate interviews. Listen, I’m an analyst. I see people four times a week. So for me, the more the merrier. However, right? But for this population and for these cases, I’m also forensic psychologist. So I go to jails and evaluate people in just one sitting. And that’s enough. It’s enough for the court. That’s enough to answer the referral question.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (51:30.86)
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (51:42.83)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (51:48.347)
So this is kind of the same thing if I pretty, with the exception of some situations where they’re retraumatized, it’s really hard to get through or perhaps something happens that we need to interrupt and continue on a different day. I typically just do it in just one sitting. And the reason for that, that I do this is not for me, but more for them. Because these are people who are all,
typically working or if they’re not working, they’re caring for a child. So coming to see me takes a big effort. They have to take time off work, they have to have somebody watch their children, they have to make their way down here, perhaps they don’t have transportation. And so I just wanna make it easier on them. If it were up to me, yes, I’d stretch it out as long as I could.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (52:27.64)
Yeah.
Mariela Shibley (52:44.591)
But I’m confident that I can get the information that I need to answer the referral question in just one sitting. Why? Because I know what I’m doing, I know what I’m asking, I know what I’m looking for.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (52:56.578)
That makes sense. Well said. So maybe we start to close. This has been incredibly helpful. And I wonder if we start to close with some myths around these evals, because you know, clinicians may be thinking about getting into this work. And, I think there are some myths that are worth addressing. Love for you to speak to those.
Mariela Shibley (52:57.73)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (53:13.391)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, well, I I mean, some of the things that I hear a lot is, you know, they think that they have to be bilingual to do this type of work. Well, first of all, you’re working with immigrants from all over the world, right? So you be like, what’s the world? What’s a word for people who speak like more than five languages? I forget what it is. But anyway, right, that’s impossible. So.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (53:26.178)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (53:39.054)
Mmm. Yeah.
Mariela Shibley (53:43.287)
Absolutely not. First of all, a lot of the evaluations are conducted in English because the people speak English, especially the cancellation or removal or the waivers because it’s the US citizen or US resident that’s coming in to see you. So those are carried out in English. And then there’s also the use of interpreters. And, you know, I mean, I have a lot to say about interpreters because I used to be an interpreter many, many years ago. Yeah. And so, so I like to…
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (54:06.526)
OK.
Mariela Shibley (54:10.583)
know, meet with them ahead of time, kind of train them, because this is very different than what they’re used to. Interpreters typically go to doctor’s offices, go to court, right? They’re not there listening to some traumatic story that might actually elicit some feelings in them, like their own history, their own trauma history, because, you know, if they’re speaking the same language, it’s also likely that they come from the same region, you know, especially if it’s a dialect, right?
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (54:37.954)
That’s fair. Yes.
Mariela Shibley (54:39.397)
So very important to know how to work with that interpreter, but they are extremely helpful. I mean, you can do very good interview with the aid of an interpreter. So yes, you don’t have to be bilingual. Of course, it helps if you speak another language. I speak Spanish and Portuguese, and it’s great, because a lot of the referrals that I get are in Spanish. But I also get referrals, know, people who speak Arabic or Vietnamese or…
Chinese or all kinds of different languages.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (55:12.334)
Right. Well, and I wonder if that’s another myth is that, you know, all of these evals are with Spanish speaking individuals, you know.
Mariela Shibley (55:21.539)
Yeah, that’s definitely a myth. again, it depends on where you live. I’m in San Diego. We’re right next door to Mexico. So we do get a lot of Spanish speakers. Absolutely. But we also have a very large Middle Eastern community here. So we have like one interpreter who speaks Arabic and we work with her consistently. She’s almost like part of the team because we’re working with those people so much. But so depending on where you live, it could be Punjabi, could be…
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (55:26.744)
Hmm. Hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (55:45.816)
Got
Mariela Shibley (55:51.163)
again, Chinese, Portuguese, wherever you are, that might be the referrals that you get more of.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (56:02.574)
I see. see. So being bilingual, that’s a myth. What else? Any other myths that you are seeing coming up? Testifying? What about testifying? Are you going to court a lot?
Mariela Shibley (56:12.667)
Yes, yes, yes, yes. Okay, good. Yeah, so the interesting thing about these cases is a lot of them are not adjudicated in court. So like waivers, like a U visa, a T visa, they’re not going to court. So there’s absolutely no risk of testifying. And even those that do go to court, like cancellation and removal and asylum, it’s not like…
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (56:22.541)
Okay.
Mariela Shibley (56:39.395)
in the criminal system where you get a subpoena and you have to go or you get to post, right? It’s really not adversarial like that at all. Yeah, so usually what ends up happening is either the attorney, which I think is gonna happen a lot more now, the attorney wants to cover all their bases and say, wrote a great report, but just in case they have a question about it, I wanna have you there as a witness.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (56:43.864)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (56:48.235)
Okay.
Mariela Shibley (57:06.573)
if they have any issues. I want to be able to say like, let’s call her in and she can testify. Or they may have gone in for a hearing and there were some issues with the report, with your opinion. And so the immigration, I’m sorry, the US, the government attorney or the judge, the immigration judge might say, we need some clarification on some things. And so they’ll invite you.
It’s not a sup, you don’t get a subpoena. They’ll just, and again, you know, I want to help my, you know, my clients cases. So, so yeah, so you would just go and it’s somewhat adversarial just in the pack, like, you know, the, the what-deer that they do for any type of testimony where they try to basically to demonstrate that you’re what makes you, qualifies you as an expert.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (57:44.354)
Yeah.
Mariela Shibley (58:04.985)
And then the opposing side is going to try to poke holes on that. So that’s not super pleasant. But you know, but at the end of the day, like you’re being very objective. You have the information that you got, you have your knowledge and that’s what you’re speaking to. You’re not speaking for the client. You know, you’re, you’re, you do the best you can. Right. And they’re bringing you in as the expert, as the one who knows.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (58:05.059)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (58:30.702)
Sure.
Mariela Shibley (58:34.275)
about something that they don’t know about. But even with that, I have to say I’ve testified about five times in my entire career and I’ve done, I mean, I’ve even signed off on more than 2000 evaluations. So it’s not very common, but I don’t know what’s gonna happen this year with this administration. I don’t know if they’re gonna want us there just in case, or if judges are gonna be like, now I wanna talk to this doctor, I don’t wanna.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (58:34.454)
Yeah.
Right.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (58:49.995)
gosh. No.
Mariela Shibley (59:04.399)
I don’t want to just read the report. I really have no idea. Maybe we can meet back in a year and I can give you an update.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (59:12.654)
Yeah, yeah, I would welcome that. Yeah, things are changing in the moment. Yeah.
Mariela Shibley (59:16.685)
And yeah, and then along those same lines, if you’re a person who’s like, absolutely not, the thought of going into a court, courthouse, you know, really frightens me. Just don’t take cases that are adjudicated in court and then you’re good to go. yeah, and tell attorneys, hey, FYI, I’m doing this evaluation. I’ll write a great report, but don’t ask me to testify. don’t, I can’t testify. And they might say,
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (59:33.006)
Sounds easy enough.
Mariela Shibley (59:42.639)
you know, now this case is pretty straightforward, we’re good. Or they might say, mm, okay, you know, then maybe I’m going to go with somebody else just in case. But either way, don’t have to, you don’t have to testify.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (59:55.566)
Great. Well said. Well, gosh, we have covered a lot. I think a lot of the, like the logistical and the sort of philosophical or emotional components of this whole process. And I think it’s incredibly timely. Like you said, and you know, for better, for worse, know, nothing else clinicians I think can look at this as, Hey, there’s a real opportunity here to do some good and
Mariela Shibley (59:57.743)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (01:00:23.609)
Yeah, and the cool thing about this work is that many, you know, I train people and many of the people I train are perhaps like clinical social workers or professional counselors or, you know, MFTs. And they never thought that they could get involved in the forensic field because they don’t have that training. But if you get the adequate training for doing these evaluations, you have the training, the education.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (01:00:36.866)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (01:00:43.736)
Mm-hmm.
Mariela Shibley (01:00:53.029)
the knowledge, that’s all you need to qualify as an expert. It doesn’t matter what your degree is, right? So that’s what I really like about this is that it doesn’t close the door to other types of mental health professionals who want to do this work. That’s very rewarding emotionally, which again, don’t let that come across in the report, but it is rewarding. You’re doing a very good job. And quite frankly, it can’t be lucrative.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (01:00:58.754)
Yeah, yeah, that’s important.
Mariela Shibley (01:01:23.053)
It’s a great way to diversify your practice to, you know, instead of being dependent on, or seeing patients, know, number of patients per week, you might say, you know, instead of so many patients, I might supplement with an evaluation. You don’t have to dedicate yourself to just do this. This is not, by all means, is not all I do.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (01:01:35.202)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (01:01:49.656)
That’s great. That’s a great point. mean, it has to be financially sustainable. Nice. Nice. Well, this is awesome. I mean, if people want to reach out, want to learn more, what is the best way to do that?
Mariela Shibley (01:01:53.835)
Right, yeah.
Mariela Shibley (01:02:04.891)
Well, they can go on my website, is psychevalcoach.com. And there I actually have a free guide if they want more information on specific cases and what they entail and what this work really looks like. I have a free guide, introductory guide to immigration evaluations that they can download and learn a bit more about it.
Dr. Jeremy Sharp (01:02:28.92)
Love it. We love free stuff. Thank you. Thank you. No, I really appreciate it. It was great to connect with you again and talk through something that, yeah, I think is super timely and really important for our country right now. So yeah, great to see you again.
Mariela Shibley (01:02:31.011)
Yes.
Yeah.
Mariela Shibley (01:02:44.365)
I agree. Okay. You too, Jeremy. Thank you.