Practice Areas: Immigration; view more
Licensed in California since: 1990
Education: Golden Gate University School of Law
Languages Spoken: Arabic, English, French
Details
Haitham Ballout is the principal attorney at Ballout Law, APC, in San Mateo, California. Mr. Ballout focuses his practice on immigration matters, serving clients throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. He has over 33 years of legal experience and develops personal relationships with each client, providing guidance through the immigration process and helping them achieve their legal goals.
Over the years, Mr. Ballout has handled many different types of immigration issues, including those involving adjustment of status, citizenship and naturalization, conditional status, criminal convictions, family-based petitions, removals, visas and waivers. He represents clients at the administrative and appellate levels and in cases involving the Convention Against Torture, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals and the Violence Against Women Act.
In honor of his accomplishments as an immigration attorney, Martindale-Hubbell awarded Mr. Ballout an AV Preeminent* peer review rating. This is the respected organization’s highest rating, presented to attorneys demonstrating high legal ability and ethical standards. Additionally, the American Immigration Lawyers Association’s Northern California Chapter presented him with its “Significant Contributions Award” in 1998.
Outside of the office, Mr. Ballout stays involved in his legal community through membership in professional organizations. He belongs to the San Mateo County Bar Association, The State Bar of California and the American Immigration Lawyers Association.
Mr. Ballout received a bachelor’s degree in engineering from San Jose State University and earned his law degree from Golden Gate University School of Law. He also participated in programs at the University of Siena in Italy and the University of Cambridge in England. He is qualified to practice law before all California state courts and the Supreme Court of the United States.
*AV®, AV Preeminent®, Martindale-Hubbell Distinguished and Martindale-Hubbell Notable are certification marks used under license in accordance with the Martindale-Hubbell certification procedures, standards and policies. Martindale-Hubbell® is the facilitator of a peer review rating process. Ratings reflect the anonymous opinions of members of the bar and the judiciary. Martindale-Hubbell® Peer Review Rating™ fall into two categories – legal ability and general ethical standards.
Practice areas
Immigration: ConsumerFocus areas
Asylum, Naturalization & Citizenship
- 100% Immigration: Consumer
First Admitted: 1990, California
Professional Webpage: https://balloutlaw.com
- Admitted to California Bar in 1990
- Admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court in 2003
- (2010) 9th Circuit -Winning outcome after Oral Argument before the 9th Circuit: remand to BIA for further consideration in the matter of Sarkis, et al v. Mukasey, 06-72875 & 08-71635. $1.3 million settlement for a pedestrian struck by a car while walking on the sidewalk(published). $850,000 for an elderly man who fell to the floor due to the negligence of another. (published Jury verdicts December 2008) 9th Circuit published opinion, BABALLAH V ASHCROFT (9th Cir. 2004) Federal Circuits, 9th Cir. (May 06, 2004) Docket number: 01-71407 U.S. Supreme Court, Petition for Ceriorari & Application for Stay, No. 07A452 (2007) U.S. Supreme Court, Petition for a writ of certiorari, Keiti Kayyal, et al., Petitioners v. Peter D. Keisler, Acting Attorney General, 07A384, submitted to Justice Kennedy (2007), 2003
- 9th Circ, Silva vs. Garland, Court overruled/reversed BIA denial and granted the petition and remanded to the agency to consider petitioner’s application for relief pursuant to the Convention Against Torture (CAT). , 2021
- Maldonado vs. Holder, 9th circ (en banc 2015), burden of proof of internal relocation modified and overruled other 9th Circuit cases in Convention Against Torture (CAT) claims. The en banc court held that Hasan and Lemus-Galvan are inconsistent with 8 C.F.R. §§ 1208.16(c)(2) and (3) because they improperly place the burden on the petitioner to prove that internal relocation is impossible. The en banc court also concluded that Singh departs from § 1208.16(c)(3) because the regulation does not specify that the inability to relocate safely is an element of claim for deferral of removal for which a petitioner bears the burden of proof, and that PerezRamirez improperly applied to the CAT context the burdenshifting scheme for internal relocation applicable to asylum claims., 2015
- Introduction by Haitham Ballout , Video by Haitham, 2018
- San Mateo Bar Association Free Legal service, held once a year
- Award for significant contributions to the AILA Northern Chapter, Significant Contributions Award, American Immigration Lawyers Association, Northern California Chapter, 1998
- Cambridge University, Cambridge, England (comparative law), University of Sienna, Sienna, Italy, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA. (Bachelor of Science, Engineering, 1982)
- Bachelor of Science, Engineeering. San Jose State University, 1982
- AV rated by Martindale-Hubbell, 2019
- 9th Circuit
- Adjustment Of Status
- All Appeals
- All Waivers
- BIA
- Deportation Defense
- Family Petitions
- Fiance(e) K-1
- Motions to reopen and reconsider
Selections
- Super Lawyers: 2010 - 2024