After Gulf War Duty, Corpsman Faces the INS : Immigration: U.S. sailor, a native of the Philippines, seeks legalized status through a rarely used loophole in law.

As far as Navy corpsman Alfredo B. Quiambao is concerned, the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service has turned out to be a tougher adversary than the Iraqi army.

Quiambao, along with Marines from the 1st Marine Regiment, defeated the Iraqis in a brief but pitched battle for the Kuwait International Airport during the Persian Gulf War. During the battle, Quiambao, 31, earned the Navy Achievement Medal for treating wounded Marines under fire.

Quiambao, a native of the Philippines, joined the Navy under an obscure law that permits Filipinos to enlist in the Navy while in the Philippines without first obtaining permanent residency. The law applies only to Filipinos and only to the Navy.

Beginning last November, about a month before deploying to the Persian Gulf, Quiambao and his Los Angeles attorney, Carl Shusterman, were frustrated by repeated attempts to convince INS officials that Quiambao’s immigrant status could be legalized through a rarely used loophole in the immigration law. Even letters to President Bush and other government officials proved fruitless.

Last April, when Quiambao returned from the Persian Gulf and went public with his problem, embarrassed INS officials said Quiambao’s situation was unique and that a compromise would be found to legalize his immigrant status.

But on Monday, Ed Kelliher, an assistant INS district director in San Diego, informed Shusterman that Quiambao, an eight-year Navy veteran, would not be getting any special privileges after all.

“Why was everyone so positive in April, and now they’re not even going to give him permanent residency? What’s going on?” Shusterman asked.

Kelliher could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

But Shusterman said that when he inquired about the decision, “Kelliher gave us the old floodgates argument; if they do it for Quiambao, thousands more will want this same relief.”

The decision may not be final, one INS spokesman said, but for now Shusterman views the move as a real setback.

If both sides agree on anything, it is that Quiambao’s case is not your run-of-the-mill immigration case.

His wife, Purita, 38, and a nurse, came to the United States eight years ago from the Philippines as a serviceman’s wife with no immigrant status. While living here, Congress passed a law in 1989 that extended special preference to foreign-born nurses, because of a nurse shortage in this country.

Consequently, Purita Quiambao became a permanent resident almost overnight and was able to sponsor the couple’s oldest daughter, Michelle, 7. A second daughter, Elaine, 1, was born here. But when Purita Quiambao attempted to sponsor her Navy husband, she ran into a roadblock.

It seems that the same law that allowed Quiambao to join the Navy also made him ineligible for permanent residency.

Technically, Quiambao had entered the United States on military orders and without a visa, INS officials said.

Shusterman, a former INS official, argued that Quiambao could be legalized by being “paroled” into the United States. INS District Director Jim Turnage--who told The Times in April that INS officials were looking for a way to resolve the problem in Quiambao’s favor--has the authority to allow Quiambao to cross the border into Mexico and permit him to return as a “parolee,” Shusterman said.

Shusterman said an INS official in Washington told him Monday that “there was no legal impediment why Quiambao can’t be paroled into the United States.”

Turnage also was unavailable for comment.

Meanwhile, INS spokesman Rudy Murillo in San Diego said Kelliher might have acted hastily.

“We feel that Kelliher’s reply (to Shusterman) is a little bit premature. But it’s understandable because Quiambao’s case is one of thousands that we’re handling. . . . The bottom line is that Turnage has the final decision. The matter has not come back to his desk and no final decision has been made,” said Murillo.

Quiambao was on duty at the Camp Pendleton Marine Corps base on Tuesday and unavailable for comment.