Attorney Cheyevna Hausmann and Dhar Law, LLP — Trusted Criminal Defense Counsel for Boston’s Brazilian and Portuguese-Speaking Communities.
Facing a criminal charge in a foreign legal system — conducted in a language that may not be your own, before judges and prosecutors who may know nothing of your culture — is among the most isolating and frightening experiences a person can endure. For members of Boston’s Brazilian community, that experience is compounded by layers of urgency: the risk of deportation, the fear of losing a student visa, the shadow a criminal record casts over an entire family’s future. These are not abstract concerns. They are the daily realities we at Dhar Law, LLP, confront on behalf of our clients.
Attorney Cheyevna (“Chey”) Hausmann is a native of Brazil, a fluent Portuguese and Spanish speaker, and a dedicated member of the Dhar Law, LLP team. She has built her practice defending individuals from Boston’s Brazilian community and the broader Lusophone world — clients who hail from São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Minas Gerais, Bahía, Goiás, Paraná, Santa Catarina, Rio Grande do Sul, Espírito Santo, Mato Grosso, Ceará, Pernambuco, Amazonas, Pará, and the Federal District of Brasília. She has counseled clients who arrived in Boston from the industrial corridors of Campinas and Belo Horizonte, from the agricultural heartlands of Ribeirão Preto and Uberlandia, from the resort cities of Florianópolis and Fortaleza, and from the favelas and suburbs of greater São Paulo alike.
Whether you are recently arrived or have lived in Massachusetts for decades, Attorney Hausmann brings to your defense something no legal database can supply: genuine cultural understanding, the ability to communicate with you and your family in your own language, and a firsthand appreciation of what is at stake when the American legal system intersects with a Brazilian life.
A Community That Deserves Elite Representation
Boston is home to one of the largest and most vibrant Brazilian communities in the United States. Tens of thousands of Brazilian nationals and Brazilian-Americans have built their lives here — working, studying, raising families, and contributing to the economic and cultural fabric of Greater Boston and the MetroWest region. Cities like Framingham, Marlborough, Milford, Somerville, Allston, and East Boston are home to flourishing Brazilian neighborhoods, restaurants, churches, and cultural associations.
Yet when members of this community encounter the criminal justice system — whether through a misunderstanding, a false accusation, or a genuine legal misstep — they often find themselves navigating alone. Language barriers, unfamiliarity with the American legal process, distrust of government institutions, and fear of immigration consequences can cause individuals to make decisions that jeopardize their futures: speaking to police without counsel, accepting a plea deal without understanding its immigration implications, or simply failing to seek help until it is too late.
Situations Where Boston’s Brazilian Community May Need Help
Students and Young People Facing First-Time Charges
Massachusetts’s colleges and universities draw thousands of Brazilian students each year. A single arrest — for shoplifting, drug possession, operating under the influence, or even a minor altercation — can unravel years of academic sacrifice. F-1 and J-1 visa holders face immediate scrutiny when charged with a crime, and a conviction can trigger visa revocation, an immigration hold, or removal proceedings. Attorney Hausmann and the Dhar Law, LLP team move decisively the moment we are retained: engaging the prosecutor’s office, pursuing pre-arraignment resolution where possible, and crafting dispositions that protect both the student’s academic standing and immigration future. We have successfully intervened on behalf of students from institutions across Greater Boston, securing outcomes that allowed them to remain enrolled and on track toward graduation.
Uncertain or Vulnerable Immigration Status
The intersection of criminal law and immigration law is perhaps the most consequential legal terrain a non-citizen can traverse. Under federal immigration law, a surprisingly broad range of criminal convictions — including some misdemeanors — can render a person deportable, inadmissible, or ineligible for naturalization. The duty articulated by the United States Supreme Court in Padilla v. Kentucky requires that defense counsel advise clients of the immigration consequences of any plea. At Dhar Law, LLP, we consider that obligation a floor, not a ceiling.
Attorney Hausmann collaborates closely with the firm’s immigration network and works to structure dispositions that minimize or eliminate adverse immigration consequences. We have represented clients across the full spectrum of immigration status — from lawful permanent residents and DACA recipients to individuals with pending visa applications and undocumented members of our community — all of whom deserved, and received, vigorous, informed defense.
Gang Accusations and Wrongful Profiling
Boston’s Brazilian community has, at times, been subjected to racial and ethnic profiling by law enforcement agencies that associate Brazilian heritage or residence in certain zip codes with gang affiliation. These accusations are frequently based on superficial connections — a shared neighborhood, a common social media contact, a visible tattoo — rather than actual criminal conduct. Dhar Law, LLP challenges these allegations at their root, engaging in rigorous discovery, moving to suppress unlawfully obtained evidence, and exposing the investigative overreach that so often underlies gang-related charges.
Attorney Hausmann brings not only legal acuity to these cases but also a cultural literacy that enables her to contextualize, for a judge or jury, the community ties that prosecutors attempt to characterize as criminal conspiracy. That ability to humanize a client, to explain who they are and where they come from, is often decisive.
Drug Offenses: Possession Through Trafficking
Drug charges in Massachusetts range from simple possession to school-zone trafficking, each carrying its own range of penalties and collateral consequences. Our attorneys defend clients across this full spectrum — from a first-time possession charge that could threaten a professional license or student visa, to complex, multi-defendant federal drug conspiracies involving allegations of distribution across state lines. We challenge the constitutional validity of stops, searches, and seizures; contest the reliability of informant testimony and laboratory evidence; and advocate aggressively for dispositions that prioritize treatment and rehabilitation over incarceration, where appropriate.
White Collar and Financial Crimes
Fraud, money laundering, embezzlement, wire fraud, tax crimes, and financial crimes of all kinds carry severe penalties and irreversible reputational consequences. Dhar Law, LLP has developed a nationally recognized white collar criminal defense practice representing executives, business owners, entrepreneurs, and professionals — including many members of the Brazilian business community in Greater Boston — in both state and federal proceedings. Our founding attorney, Vikas S. Dhar, has been recognized by Boston Magazine as a Super Lawyer in white collar criminal defense every year from 2008 through 2025, and the firm’s work in this area has been profiled by the New York Tines, Boston Globe, Forbes Magazine, and Harvard Business Review.
In an era of aggressive federal enforcement, Brazilian nationals engaged in international commerce, cross-border wire transfers, and multi-jurisdictional business dealings are increasingly exposed to federal scrutiny under statutes including the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, Bank Secrecy Act, and the money laundering provisions of Title 18. We understand this landscape and defend against it with precision.
International and Cross-Border Criminal Matters
For clients with ties to Brazil and other countries, a domestic criminal investigation can rapidly escalate into an international crisis. Dhar Law, LLP is a nationally recognized leader in international extradition defense and Interpol Red Notice counsel — a practice that requires mastery of treaty law, constitutional protections applicable in extradition proceedings, and the operational realities of international law enforcement cooperation.
We have represented clients facing extradition requests from foreign governments, individuals wrongfully listed on Interpol’s Red Notice database, and clients whose assets have been restrained pursuant to international mutual legal assistance treaty requests. If you or a family member is facing the prospect of international criminal jeopardy — whether in the United States or involving proceedings in Brazil — the Dhar Law, LLP international criminal defense team is uniquely positioned to help.
Domestic Violence and Assault Charges
Domestic violence charges in Massachusetts can arise from a single call to police, often before any independent investigation is conducted. Massachusetts law enforcement and prosecutors pursue these cases aggressively, and the consequences of a conviction — loss of a firearms license, immigration consequences, restraining orders that affect access to one’s children and home — can be profound. We defend clients against both straightforward and complex domestic assault allegations, including cases involving allegations between family members, intimate partners, and household residents. We analyze primary aggressor determinations, challenge the sufficiency of probable cause, and rigorously cross-examine complainant witnesses at trial.
Homicide, Violent Offenses, and Serious Felonies
When the stakes are highest — when freedom itself is at stake — Dhar Law, LLP deploys the full resources of a top-ranked firm. Our attorneys have tried homicide, armed robbery, sexual assault, and other serious felony cases in Massachusetts Superior Court and in the federal district courts. We engage private investigators with law enforcement backgrounds, forensic evidence experts, ballistics specialists, and psychiatric and psychological consultants. We prepare every case as if it will go to trial, because we know that thorough preparation is the foundation of every favorable outcome, whether in the courtroom or at the negotiating table.
Why the Brazilian Community Trusts Attorney Chey Hausmann and Dhar Law, LLP
An Attorney Who Shares Your Background and Speaks Your Language
Attorney Chey Hausmann’s connection to the Brazilian community is not a marketing strategy — it is her lived experience. Born and raised in Brazil, she understands the pressures facing Brazilian-American families navigating a legal system designed in a language and cultural tradition very different from their own. She conducts consultations in Portuguese and Spanish, ensuring that clients and their families fully understand their rights, their options, and the likely consequences of every decision they face. That linguistic and cultural fluency extends to the practical: understanding how Brazilian clients communicate with their families, how they approach authority, what their community networks look like, and how to present their stories to American judges and juries in a way that is accurate, dignified, and compelling.
Exceptional Academic and Professional Credentials
Attorney Hausmann holds a Juris Doctor from the Massachusetts School of Law, where she concentrated in criminal law, and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and International Relations from Suffolk University, where she was inducted into Pi Sigma Alpha, the national political science honor society — a distinction reserved for students demonstrating exceptional academic achievement. She completed the rigorous Zealous Advocacy courtroom training program, which focuses on the practical skills of cross-examination, witness preparation, and jury communication. She has trained under Dhar Law’s senior trial attorneys and has developed a meticulous, detail-oriented approach to case preparation that clients consistently describe as reassuring and thorough.
The Dhar Law, LLP Platform: A National Reputation in Your Corner
Dhar Law, LLP was founded by Vikas S. Dhar, one of Boston’s most recognized criminal defense attorneys, with over two decades of experience in federal criminal defense, white collar matters, and Massachusetts state court litigation. The firm has been profiled by Forbes Magazine, the Harvard Business Review, the ABA Journal, the Boston Globe, and the Boston Business Journal. Its attorneys have been invited to the White House, have served as delegates hosting international leaders, and have lectured at Harvard, Boston College, Boston University, and NYU. Founding Attorney Dhar has been named a Boston Magazine Super Lawyer in white collar criminal defense every year from 2008 through 2025, and a National Trial Lawyers Top 100 Massachusetts Defense Attorney.
When you retain Attorney Hausmann, you do not retain a solo practitioner operating without resources. You retain the full platform of Dhar Law, LLP: eleven attorneys with over one hundred combined years of experience, a multilingual legal team with capabilities in Portuguese, Spanish, Arabic, French, and Mandarin, a network of forensic experts and investigators, and a firm culture built on the conviction that elite defense is available to every client, in every case.
Comprehensive Community Commitment
Dhar Law, LLP’s commitment to the communities we serve extends well beyond the courtroom. Our community partners include Habitat for Humanity, Boston Pride, Bridge Over Troubled Water, Senior Partners for Justice, and the Boston Municipal Court Lawyer Advisor Resource (LAR) Program. We have delivered “Know Your Rights” seminars to community groups across Greater Boston, including in the Brazilian and Lusophone communities of Framingham, Marlborough, and East Boston. We are members of the Criminal Justice Act Panel (serving as one of approximately 125 appointed attorneys statewide) and the Committee for Public Counsel Services (CPCS) Murder List (one of approximately 100 attorneys statewide), reflecting the confidence that the federal and state courts have placed in the quality of our representation.
A Multilingual, Multicultural Firm
Dhar Law, LLP’s eleven-attorney team brings multilingual capabilities that reflect the diverse populations we serve. Our attorneys communicate with clients in Portuguese, Spanish, Arabic, and French. This linguistic reach means that a client’s family members, witnesses, or business associates whose primary language is not English can participate meaningfully in their loved one’s defense — not through an interpreter assigned by the court, but through their own attorney.
Elite Defense. Every Client. Every Case.
At Dhar Law, LLP, there is no tiered system of representation. Every client — whether a Brazilian graduate student facing a first-time charge, a business owner under federal investigation, or an individual confronting a serious violent felony — receives the same commitment to exhaustive preparation, strategic advocacy, and zealous representation. We deploy private investigators, forensic specialists, and expert witnesses. We engage prosecutors early and often, seeking to end investigations before charges are filed and to resolve cases at the earliest possible stage. When cases proceed to trial, we fight to win.
Attorney Chey Hausmann is an inspiring advocate who brings clarity, direction, and genuine human warmth to her clients during some of the most frightening moments of their lives. She does not simply explain the law; she listens, she understands, and she fights.
You Do Not Have to Face This Alone. Contact Dhar Law, LLP today for a confidential consultation in English, Portuguese, or Spanish. Call 617-880-6155.
