Ruling Strengthens Rights of Some Immigrants

In a decision that strengthens the rights of some immigrants, a federal court ruled Tuesday for a second time that a new law limiting deportation appeals does not apply if the appeal was pending before the law took effect.

Ruling in the case of a burglar trying to avoid deportation, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said that the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act only limits judges’ jurisdiction over appeals that began after the law took effect in 1996.

The ruling reinforces a 1998 ruling on another immigrant.

The current case revolved around Jose Marcelo Alberto-Gonzalez, who was about 4 years old when he arrived in the United States in 1965. He has been convicted of burglary and receiving stolen property.

After he was sentenced in 1994 to 79 days in jail for burglary, the Immigration and Naturalization Service charged him with being deportable for committing two crimes of “moral turpitude.”

Alberto-Gonzalez requested that an immigration judge give him a waiver of deportation, but was turned down. He appealed to the Board of Immigration Appeals, which ruled that the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act had taken away the right to appeal that an immigrant such as Alberto-Gonzalez would have had under the preceding law.

The appeals court said the earlier law continues to take precedence. It also ruled that Alberto-Gonzalez’s crimes of “moral turpitude” were not deportable offenses because he was imprisoned for less than one year.