In the last three years, more than one million people were deported by the Obama administration. This year alone, there were 368,920 removals. While President Obama promised immigration reform before being elected, the irony of deporting more immigrants than the past administration becomes really alarming.
Tears fell on a mother’s face as her son was walking along the court’s hallway with handcuffs on his wrists and metal chains on his legs. Her son, Roddy, is a green card holder. He arrived in the United States when he was 18 years old as a derivative child on his mother’s petition.
Upon Roddy’s arrival in the United States, he was enrolled in high school. His parents, just like those of many new immigrants, preoccupied themselves with work. Roddy’s mother worked two jobs. He was left alone at home most of the time.
In 2001, three years after Roddy’s arrival, he was busted for illegal use of methampethamines and drug trafficking. Roddy served three months of jail time as a result of his drug convictions. After he was released in 2003, Roddy finished his associate degree and maintained a decent job at a retail store. He has a one-year-old child and a US citizen fiancé.
In his desire to become a US citizen, Roddy applied for naturalization at the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). He had asked for a day’s leave from work and appeared at his naturalization interview. He anticipated a favorable ruling on his application. He never expected to be taken into custody by agents of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
What happened was that the USCIS officer found out about Roddy’s criminal convictions for drug offenses ten years ago. Despite having served his sentence, US immigration law provides “mandatory detention” for immigrants with certain drug convictions and other aggravated felonies.
Roddy appeared before an immigration judge, seeking leniency and compassion. But he was told that the law was clear about his case: He was to be deported.
Roddy’s mother has not been sleeping since her son was arrested and blames herself for his fate. She said her son was raised well in the Philippines and never got into trouble with the law until he arrived in California. He was hanging out with the wrong crowd, she lamented.
But she wants to know why, if her son had served his sentence and was rehabilitated would he now be deported and separated from his family?
At the beginning of this year, all of Roddy’s siblings got their visas and also migrated to the US. Roddy will be by himself in the Philippines. The irony of this is that Roddy was the the only child who was able to migrate with his parents while his three older siblings were left behind awaiting for their petitions to be processed. Now that his three siblings finally arrived in the US Roddy is on his way back.
The mother is agonizing over whether or not to give up her life in the US and voluntarily return to the Philippines with her son.
Immigrants with past criminal convictions or immigration violations must be cautious about applying for US citizenship. Just like the case of Roddy, despite the passage of many years of being reformed, the US immigration law’s restrictive enforcement rules may catch up with applicants.
Green card holders with past criminal cases or immigration violations can also be apprehended and sent back through the ports of entry. These green card holders with previous convictions, after having traveled back and forth numerous times, are now (for the first time and to their surprise) being identified by the Department of Homeland Security’s computer database and being deferred for further inspection.
That fact that an individual has traveled successfully in the past does not mean that the previous conviction record will not come to light. If the arriving green card holder with a conviction requiring mandatory detention is identified, the arriving passenger may be arrested just like Roddy.
If you have a prior criminal conviction, you should be sufficiently aware of these possibilities.
(Tancinco may be reached at law@tancinco.com or at 887 7177 or 721 1963)