Ten years ago yesterday, Indera DeMine registered a business with the state of Florida days after losing her job. This is the story of what she and Tom built together, and why it looks the way it does today.
On September 16, 2016, Indera DeMine sat down and registered a business with the State of Florida. She had been let go from her job at a local immigration firm just days earlier. She has called it one of the lowest points of her life.
She didn't look for another job. She built her own firm, and her husband, attorney Tom DeMine, was right there with her from the start.
The name was simple: DeMine Immigration. There was no real office at first, just a storage room the two of them shared. Indera has said she was embarrassed to meet clients there. It didn't stop either of them.
Indera immigrated to the United States from Guyana at 15. She went through high school and college in New York City, then earned her law degree at Ave Maria School of Law before becoming a licensed Florida attorney. She has described her own path bluntly: from being an undocumented immigrant to becoming an immigration attorney.
Tom came at the law from a different direction. He started as a prosecutor in Lee County, then spent close to a decade in private criminal defense before joining Indera's firm outright in 2020 and shifting his practice fully into immigration law. Two very different legal backgrounds, aimed at the same thing.
That combination is part of why the firm operates the way it does. Families who come through DeMine's doors are often stressed. Sometimes frightened. Almost always skeptical of legal promises, and for good reason.
No matter where your parents came from, or what your financial status is, it is possible.
Indera DeMine, Founder
What started in a storage room has grown into a firm serving Southwest Florida's Hispanic and Haitian communities, now with a presence reaching well beyond its original downtown Fort Myers office.
Indera has also talked about using the firm as a training ground. Several of the young women who've worked there have gone on to law school themselves, something she says she's proud of.
Immigration law rarely moves fast, and it never comes with guarantees. That was true in 2016. It's still true now.
Every case is different, and the team at DeMine Immigration is here to walk through what that means for yours.
DeMine Immigration Law Firm
Every family who has trusted us with their case over the past decade made this milestone possible. If you have questions about your own immigration options, we invite you to sit down with us.
Schedule a Consultation →Individual immigration cases depend on each person's specific circumstances and should be evaluated individually. This article is for educational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice.