Legal News

Federal appellate judges criticize immigration judges

By Jason Siegel

Federal appellate judges continue to criticize immigration judges and Department of Homeland Security litigation tactics, The National Law Journal reported.

The article provides two examples at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

In one case, the 9th Circuit ordered a new immigration judge to take over the asylum case of Egyptian Coptic Christians and criticized the government for losing the case's record and failing to recover it for appellate arguments.

In another, the court reinstated the asylum claim by a Chaldean Christian woman from Iraq, criticizing an immigration judge for citing a nonexistent State Department report claiming that conditions in Iraq changed sufficiently after the fall of Saddam Hussein and his Ba'ath party, and ruling that she could return without fear of persecution. The judge relied on a 2003 Washington Times news clipping.

Both cases involved people who say they fled after enduring rape and other violence.

Read the full story here

Full post as published by Legal Pad | LA on July 08, 2008 (boomark / email).