Category: Removal & Deportation

The State of Virginia, always at the forefront of the Immigration debate, is preparing to open one of the East Coast’s largest detention facilities in Farmville, VA. The facility will be used to imprison foreign nationals for immigration violations.  Many of the inhabitants of the facility would have once been free with their families before they encountered U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Detention facilities used by ICE are often […]

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in United States v. White, 606 F.3d 144 (4th Cir. 2010) applied the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Johnson (wherein the Supreme Court held simple touching doesn’t constitute “physical force” under the Armed Career Criminal Act). The Fourth Circuit held that section 18.2-57.2(A) of the Virginia Code Annotated includes nonviolent force, such as an offensive touching, and that “violent force,” as […]

The Board issued a major decision in the Crimigration area holding: “The misdemeanor offense of assault and battery against a family or household member in violation of section 18.2-57.2(A) of the Virginia Code Annotated is not categorically a crime of violence under 18 U.S.C. § 16(a) (2006) and therefore not categorically a crime of domestic violence within the meaning of section […]

In Johnson v. United States, the Supreme Court held that in order to constitute a “violent felony” under the relevant provisions of the Armed Career Criminal Act (“ACCA”), the level of “physical force” required for a conviction must be “violent force-that is, force capable of causing physical pain or injury to another person.” See 18 U.S.C. §§ 924(e)(1), (2)(B)(i) (2006). Simple battery under Florida […]

On March 31, 2010, after decades of hundreds of thousands of immigrants being deported because of ineffective criminal lawyers, the Supreme Court issued a landmark decision to put criminal defense attorneys on notice:  No longer can they blindly and ineffectively compel clients to accept any deal offered by the prosecutor. In Padilla v. Kentucky, the Supreme Court held that the Sixth […]

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit refused to allow an Immigration Judge and the Board of Immigration Appeals to issue an adverse credibility finding (meaning conclude that an applicant for Asylum & related protections was not believable) based on the facts of someone else’s case. InJian Tao Lin v. Holder, No. 09-1269 (July 12, 2010), the Fourth Circuit […]

ICE released a memo highlighting in order the priority of order it should use to apprehend and especially detain individuals. ICE Assistant Secretary John Morton noted that ICE “only has resources to remove approximately 400,000 aliens per year, less than 4 percent of the estimated illegal alien poplulation in the United States.”  Secretary Morton went on to note given their […]

In Matter of Jesus INTERIANO-ROSA, 25 I&N Dec. 264 (BIA 2010), the Board of Immigration Appeals held that “When an application for relief is timely filed but supporting documents are not submitted within the time established, the Immigration Judge may deem the opportunity to file the documents to be waived but may not deem the application itself abandoned.”

In Matter of CASTILLO-PADILLA, 25 I&N Dec. 257 (BIA 2010), the Board of Immigration Appeals held: “(1) Conditional parole under section 236(a)(2)(B) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1226(a)(2)(B) (2006), is a distinct and different procedure from parole under section 212(d)(5)(A) of the Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1182(d)(5)(A) (2006). (2) An alien who was released from custody on […]

The Supreme Court stated its June 14, 2010 decision in Carachuri-Rosendo v. Holder that “Second or subsequent simple possession offenses are not aggravated felonies under §1101(a)(43) when … the state conviction is not based on the fact of a prior conviction.” “[O]nly recidivist simple possession offenses are “punishable” as a federal “felony” under the Controlled Substances Act, 18 U. S. C. §924(c)(2)” Citing its earlier decision, the […]