Appellate Law

CA1: Copt not that oppressed

By S. COTUS

Abdelmalek v. Mukasey, No. 07-2819 denies a petition for review of an asylum-seeking Egyptian Coptic Christian.  He is a doctor, whose wife owned a building that collapsed killing a lot of Muslims.  The First denies the petition for review.  However, saying that he wasn't really oppressed.  However, I am a little disturbed the First's remarks:

It is never a pleasant task to attempt to quantify an individual's suffering and measure it against the suffering of others, but it must be remarked that this court has recently denied petitions for review filed by other Egyptian Copts who suffered mistreatment at least equal to, if not greater than, that allegedly suffered by Abdelmalek.

See, remarks like this create dangerous precedent.  Courts adjudicate petitions for review on an individual basis.  They don't adjudicate the status of ethic groups or the suckiness of countries.  If anything, the State Department does this.  I discussed this here.

For the travails of another Coptic doctor see here.

Full post as published by Appellate Law and Practice on August 25, 2008 (boomark / email).