We all have been reading about The Obama administration changing the federal immigration enforcement strategy, in ways that reduce the threat of deportation for millions of illegal immigrants. The changes focus enforcement on immigrants who have committed serious crimes, an effort to unclog immigration courts and detention centers. A record…
This is interesting. An illegal immigrant who filed a civil lawsuit over the ownership of a $750,000 lottery ticket has won the right to stay in the country to fight his legal battle. His lawyer, successfully sought a deferred action on Cua-Toc’s removal order from the U.S. Department of Homeland…
Using a little-known government program, the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has pushed nearly 160,000 immigrants — many with deep ties to the United States — through an expedited deportation process, sometimes without adequately informing them of their right to a day in court. Federal authorities are increasingly…
We wanted to be the first to report of an alarming trend that we just learned about last month. Over the past month we received calls from family members of detained individuals who were picked up coming into San Diego via domestic flights from NYC, Miami and Atlanta. Most of…
Attorney Andrew Desposito of our office wrote this brief commentary on the split in courts across the country with their application of Padilla v. Kentucky The U.S. Supreme Court case Padilla v. Kentucky (2010) was an important ruling for many aliens facing deportation. In that case, the U.S. Supreme Court…
It is tempting to imagine that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has adopted a kinder and more just approach to its immigration enforcement mission. After all, the department announced in recent days that it will henceforth focus its enforcement efforts on “high priority” immigration cases; that is, those cases…
A couple weeks ago, Representative Luis V. Gutierrez, a Democrat from Illinois who has become a perennial thorn on immigration for President Obama, was arrested Tuesday afternoon along with about a dozen activists in a protest outside the White House. The protesters were arrested peacefully after they sat down on…
Ekaterina Powell from our office brings us up to date with this recent development. Aliens who have controlled substance convictions are generally deportable and ineligible for adjustment of status (with certain exceptions for simple possession of 30 grams or less of marijuana). Whenever an alien enters a guilty plea or…
A New York judge released Dominique Strauss-Kahn from house arrest Friday, after prosecutors presented evidence questioning the credibility of the hotel maid who accused the former International Monetary Fund chief of sexual assault. The alleged victim, a 32-year-old immigrant from Guinea, admitted to prosecutors that she lied about the specifics…
In line with what we heard at the National Immigration Law Conference Last week, John Morton, the head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said the deportation program would continue to expand as planned in order to be operating nationwide by 2013, despite criticism from many police chiefs and from the…