Cheikh Fall explains how to write an asylum application in much the same way that he used to teach his high school students to write English essays. The introduction, he says, is for biographical facts: “I was born on this date, in this place, of this ethnicity.” The second section is for describing the persecution people of your identity face in your home country.

The next section is where you depict the incidents that forced you to flee. Details are important — “if it was dark or light when they took you, what you said to them, where they drove you,” Fall explained, describing a hypothetical government kidnapping. ”What were the subjects of the interrogation? If they tortured you, where did it happen?”

For nearly two decades, Fall has worked as a translator and liaison between immigration lawyers and their West African clients. Fixers like Fall help new immigrants find lawyers, while supplying attorneys with a reliable client base.

In a system riddled with scams and fraud, they also help honest lawyers establish trust in immigrant communities. They’re an important but often overlooked part of the immigration legal ecosystem, especially for communities whose languages aren’t commonly spoken in the US.