Justia U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

After petitioner prevailed on an application for a writ of habeas corpus seeking release from federal immigration detention, he sought to recover attorney's fees under the Equal Access to Justice Act. The Fourth Circuit has previously held, pursuant to O'Brien v. Moore, 395 F.3d 499, 508 (4th Cir. 2005), that the Act does not apply to a habeas proceeding seeking release from criminal detention. The court held that the same is true for habeas proceedings seeking release from civil detention. Therefore, the court affirmed the district court's denial of attorney's fees because the Act does not provide a basis for petitioner to recover attorney's fees. View "Obando-Segura v. Garland" on Justia Law

The Fourth Circuit granted the petition for review of the BIA's final order affirming the denial of petitioner's application for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the Convention Against Torture. Petitioner alleged that the IJ and the BIA made several legal errors in their consideration of his claims for withholding of removal and for relief under the Convention Against Torture (CAT).The court held that IJs have a legal duty to develop the record, which takes on particular importance in pro se cases, and that the IJ in this case erred in failing to discharge that duty. The court also concluded that the BIA erred in refusing to consider petitioner's particular social groups based on Matter of W-Y-C- and in mischaracterizing his claim. In regard to the CAT claim, and pursuant to Rodriguez-Arias v. Whitaker, 915 F.3d 968 (4th Cir. 2019), the court agreed with petitioner that the BIA erred in failing to consider and aggregate the risk of torture from different sources. Furthermore, neither the IJ nor the BIA duly considered all of the record evidence relevant to whether the Salvadoran government would consent to or acquiescence in torture. Accordingly, the court vacated petitioner's final order of removal and remanded to the BIA with instructions to remand the case to the IJ for further fact-finding and reconsideration. View "Arevalo Quintero v. Garland" on Justia Law

Defendant was found in the United States after having previously been removed under the expedited removal procedure of 8 U.S.C. 1225(b)(1). Defendant was charged with reentry without permission after having been removed, in violation of 8 U.S.C. 1326(a).The Fourth Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of defendant's motion to dismiss the indictment, rejecting defendant's claim that his 2016 expedited removal order was "fundamentally unfair" for lack of representation by counsel during the removal proceeding, as guaranteed by the Due Process Clause and afforded by the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), and therefore was invalid. The court concluded that the Due Process Clause did not entitle defendant to counsel when apprehended at the border and promptly removed. Furthermore, the court rejected defendant's contention that the APA requires — as an additional procedural right in removal proceedings — that the alien have the opportunity to obtain counsel in expedited removal proceedings under section 1225(b)(1)(A)(i). View "United States v. Guzman" on Justia Law

DHS Agent Swivel saw someone whom he thought he recognized from a prior case. It was Santos-Portillo, a Honduran national who was in the U.S. illegally, having been deported in 2011. Agents staked out Santos-Portillo’s house, arrested Santos-Portillo. and took him to an ICE office, where he was fingerprinted. Agent Swivel then gave Santos-Portillo Miranda warnings and interrogated him. Santos-Portillo admitted he was from Honduras, that he had previously been deported, and that he had not obtained permission to return to the U.S. Santos-Portillo was charged with violating 8 U.S.C. 1326(a). At Santos-Portillo’s detention hearing Swivel testified that he neither sought nor secured an administrative arrest warrant to detain Santos-Portillo. Santos-Portillo unsuccessfully moved to suppress all post-arrest evidence, citing 8 U.S.C. 1357(a), which permits warrantless arrests only if agents have probable cause and have a “reason to believe . . . there is [a] likelihood of the person escaping before a warrant can be obtained.”Santos-Portillo was convicted and deported again. The Fourth Circuit affirmed. Section 1357(a) does not authorize courts to suppress evidence for violations of the provision. Based on a “proper respect for Congress’s role in determining the consequences of statutory violations,” the court rejected a request to exercise its discretion to create a suppression remedy. View "United States v. Santos-Portillo" on Justia Law

After being placed in removal proceedings, petitioner sought a U visa. However, petitioner could not acquire the visa without a waiver of inadmissibility. Petitioner requested that waiver from USCIS, but USCIS denied the request.The Fourth Circuit granted the petition for review of the BIA's decision affirming the IJ's order of removal, concluding that the DOJ's regulations empower the IJ to consider petitioner's application for an inadmissibility waiver under 8 U.S.C. 1182(d)(3)(A)(ii). The court explained that an IJ's ability to grant a section 1182(d)(3)(A)(ii) waiver is consistent with the statutory and regulatory scheme, which entrusts IJs with the responsibility to determine a petitioner's admissibility in removal proceedings, as well as the forms of relief available. The court remanded for the IJ to determine what relief, if any, to which petitioner is entitled, including whether an inadmissibility waiver is appropriate. View "Jimenez-Rodriguez v. Garland" on Justia Law

After petitioner was convicted of drug and firearm offenses in Georgia, the state pardoned him. However, DHS sought to remove petitioner based on his convictions before the pardon. The IJ ordered petitioner's removal and the BIA dismissed the appeal.The Fourth Circuit dismissed in part and denied in part the petition for review, concluding that petitioner failed to exhaust his argument that pardoned offenses do not qualify as convictions under the Immigration and Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. 1101 et seq. The court also concluded that a pardon waives only the removal grounds specifically enumerated in the Act, and petitioner's pardon does not waive all of the removal grounds proven by the government. View "Tetteh v. Garland" on Justia Law

The Fourth Circuit affirmed the district court's dismissal of an action brought by former ICE civil detainees, seeking wages owed under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) for work performed while detained. The district court dismissed based on the grounds that this circuit and others have declined to extend the FLSA to custodial settings.The court concluded that appellants' claims are foreclosed by this circuit's precedent and the well-established principles governing the interpretation of the FLSA. The court explained that the FLSA was enacted to protect workers who operate within "the traditional employment paradigm," and persons in custodial detention—such as appellants—are not in an employer-employee relationship but in a detainer-detainee relationship that falls outside that paradigm. The court noted that the FLSA was a congressional creation, and its expansion is a matter for Congress as well. The court explained that what appellants propose is a fundamental alteration of what it means to be an "employee," and if Congress wishes to apply the FLSA to custodial detentions, it is certainly free to do so. View "Ndambi v. CoreCivic, Inc." on Justia Law

The Fourth Circuit granted a petition for review of the BIA's decision affirming the IJ's conclusion that petitioner was not eligible for asylum, withholding of removal, or protection under the Convention Against Torture (CAT). The court concluded that the Board erred in adopting the IJ's rationale regarding the corroborating evidence in this case; the Board committed legal error in concluding that petitioner had not established past persecution; and the Board committed legal error in concluding that petitioner had not established a nexus between her persecution and her particular social group. The court explained that the evidence established that petitioner's relationship with her husband's nuclear family was at least one central reason for her persecution and, likely, was the dominant reason. The court remanded for the Board to further consider petitioner's asylum claim so that she may receive the benefit of the presumption that she has a well-founded fear of future persecution if she returns to Honduras. View "Arita-Deras v. Wilkinson" on Justia Law

The Fourth Circuit granted a petition for review of the BIA's decision dismissing petitioner's appeal of the denial of her requests for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the Convention Against Torture (CAT). Petitioner claims that she received repeated death threats from a gang in Guatemala after she and her family witnessed a mass killing by gang members and refused to acquiesce to the gang's extortion and other demands.The court rejected the Board's "excessively narrow" view of the nexus requirement, and concluded that petitioner established that her familial ties were one central reason for her persecution. In this case, the record conclusively establishes a nexus between the death threats made against petitioner and her ties to her nuclear family. The court also concluded that the record conclusively establishes that the Guatemalan government was unable or unwilling to control petitioner's persecutors. Accordingly, the court remanded to the Board to reconsider petitioner's claims. View "Diaz De Gomez v. Wilkinson" on Justia Law

An alien may seek to avoid deportation by showing a clear probability that, if deported, he will be persecuted because of his race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group. If an alien claims he will be persecuted because of his membership in a political social group, that political social group must be "particular."The Fourth Circuit granted the petition for review in part and remanded the BIA's final order of removal, concluding that the BIA's determination that "Salvadoran MS-13 members" lacks particularity is unreasonable. In this case, the BIA's description of the particularity requirement in Matter of W-G-R-, 26 I&N Dec. 208, 221–22 (BIA 2014), impermissibly conflates it with the social distinction requirement; the BIA's flawed particularity articulation informed its rejection of the political social group in W-G-R-; and the BIA unreasonably grounded its rejection of the political social group in W-G-R- in part on the fact that it could further subdivide the group in any number of ways. Therefore, the court remanded petitioner's withholding claim for the BIA to consider the IJ's other holdings with respect to that claim. However, because the record does not compel a different understanding of the evidence, the court denied the petition for review of petitioner's claim under the Convention Against Torture. View "Amaya v. Rosen" on Justia Law