Our dedicated team of immigration attorneys at Derres and Associates PLLC is committed to providing exceptional legal services and guiding clients through their immigration journey. With our experience, mastery, and personalized approach, we are here to help you achieve your immigration goals. Get to know our team of skilled professionals below:

Amha Derres

Attorney/Managing Member

Mr. Derres’s extensive experience focuses on detention and deportation defense, asylum, family-based immigration, nonimmigrant visas including religious worker visas, waiver of inadmissibility, and naturalization. Mr. Derres is also adept at handling appeals before the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) and U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Fourth, Sixth and Ninth Circuits.

Mr. Derres successfully represented hundreds of clients from Africa, the Middle East, and Asia before USCIS offices all over the United States, immigration courts, the Board of Immigration Appeals and U.S. Court of Appeals. Among his clients are business executives, religious leaders, artists, musicians, athletes, and graduate students.

Mr. Derres leverages his extensive experience in the fields of immigration and refugee laws and takes a personal approach when working with clients on a one-to-one basis to develop customized and pragmatic solutions that assist them to achieve their goals.

Mr. Derres earned his Master’s of Law (LL.M.) degree in U.S. law with a concentration on immigration law and human rights from Washington School of Law in St. Louis. After earning his LL.M., Mr. Derres interned for the St. Louis 22nd Circuit Court.

Before founding Derres and Associates, PLLC, Mr. Derres worked for the Law Offices of David Garfield and was a partner at Plenpovo Law PLLC. Mr. Derres also worked as Refugee Protection Assistant and Legal Advisor to United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Eritrea, East Africa.

Mr. Derres is admitted to practice law in the state of New York and the District of Columbia (D.C.) and is admitted before multiple federal appellate courts, including the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth, Sixth and Ninth Circuits. Mr. Derres is also a member of the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) and Capital Area Immigrant’ Rights (CAIR) Coalition.

Mr. Derres is fluent in Tigrinya and Amharic.