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Thursday, August 10, 2006

Law - DOJ moves to improve immigration judges, after months of criticism

Some readers may recall this Dec. 26, 2005 ILB entry, quoting from several stories critical of U.S. immigration judges. The 7th Circuit has not been reticent in criticizing the rulings of immigration judges - see for example this ruling by Judge Posner from 12/29/05 that begins:

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, we reiterate our oft-expressed concern with the adjudication of asylum claims by the Immigration Court and the Board of Immigration Appeals and with the defense of the BIA’s asylum decisions in this court by the Justice Department’s Office of Immigration Litigation. See Benslimane v. Gonzales, No. 04-1339, 2005 WL 3193641, at *1 (7th Cir. Nov. 30, 2005), and cases cited there. The performance of these federal agencies is too often inadequate. This case presents another depressing example.
Today the LA Times has a story headed "Immigration Judges Get New Regulations: Atty. Gen. Gonzales plans to hire more jurists and improve their performance after a review of alleged abuses and incompetence." Here are some quotes from thestory:
WASHINGTON — Under pressure from human rights groups, the Bush administration announced plans Wednesday to improve the performance of immigration judges, responding to reports of intemperate and abusive jurists and complaints about how the system has dealt with a growing backlog of cases.

The moves, announced by U.S. Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales, include establishing periodic performance evaluations and implementing proficiency exams for judges who are appointed after Dec. 31.

Gonzales said that he also would seek to hire more immigration judges and to add four members to the 11-person Board of Immigration Appeals.

The moves were among 22 recommendations made by a Justice Department task force that Gonzales established in January to review the performance of the nation's 224 immigration judges, including 55 in California.

The review was ordered after immigrant-rights groups alleged that judges were wrongly deporting people or denying bids for political asylum because of erroneous evidence or incompetence.

In one instance, an appellate board found that a political asylum case involving an Albanian citizen was mishandled because the judge relied on testimony from a document expert who did not speak or read Albanian. In another case, a judge in Boston was suspended after he referred to himself as "Tarzan" during a court proceeding for a Ugandan woman named Jane.

There have also been concerns that an overhaul of the immigration appeals system, instituted in 2002 by then-Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft, denied noncitizens their rights to due process.

Ashcroft implemented measures aimed at helping the immigration appeals board reduce a backlog of more than 50,000 cases.

Responding to pressure to clear the docket, the appeals board, which traditionally worked in panels of three, began reviewing cases individually, often rendering decisions within minutes and without explanation.

The rate at which board members ruled against foreigners facing deportation soared. Those rulings, in turn, led to more appeals to the federal court system, creating another large and cumbersome backlog.

A different slant on the story is presented in this report today from the NY Times:
WASHINGTON, Aug. 9 — Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales warned the nation’s 215 immigration judges on Wednesday that they all faced annual performance evaluations for the first time and regular scrutiny to detect high reversal rates, frequent complaints or unusual backlogs.

But the consequences of failing were not spelled out. And some of the judges said they worried that evaluations would increase pressure on all judges to make decisions faster, without weeding out the handful of judges who have drawn the most criticism.

Immigration judges, who now handle 300,000 cases a year under stepped-up guidelines, are employees of the Justice Department, not the federal judiciary. After battling for years to unionize, they ratified their first labor contract on Monday.

Performance evaluations were among several measures, most still in the planning stages, that Mr. Gonzales announced here in a luncheon speech at the judges’ annual training conference. He has been under mounting pressure to disclose the findings of a comprehensive review that he ordered last January after federal appeals courts around the country complained of a pattern of biased and incoherent decisions on asylum and rebuked some immigration judges by name for “bullying” and “brow-beating” people seeking refuge from persecution. * * *

Mr. Gonzales acknowledged that many critics attributed the problems to recent changes intended to streamline the Board of Immigration Appeals. Many federal judges say the changes, which reduced the number of judges on the board to 11 from 23, turned the board’s internal review of immigration judges’ decisions into a rubber stamp, shifting the burden of re-examination to the federal courts.

But the attorney general defended those changes, saying they had worked to reduce a big backlog, while suggesting that a few modifications might be made. He said he would seek to add four members to the board, who would also be subject to yearly evaluations, and devise a system to identify cases appealed to federal court and refer them back to the board for additional review.

Via the U of Pittsburgh's excellent law blog, Jurist, here is a copy of the DOJ's press release.

Finally for now, several papers reported earlier this week on a database of immigration judges' records. Here, for instance, is the AP story presented in the Seattle Times. Some quotes:

ALBANY, N.Y. -- In the past, immigrants could only rely on gossip to determine whether a particlular immigration judge has a tendency to rule for or against asylum.

But they gained a new tool Monday, when information on backgrounds and records of most of the nation's 200-plus immigration judges was published in one place for the first time.

The online database shows each judge's denial rates in asylum cases, giving immigrants and their attorneys new insight. They may even be inspired to try to get their cases moved to a friendlier court.

"You just have one chance," said Susan Long, co-director of the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University, which released the information. The project collects and analyzes federal government data.

"You learn a lot in court, but not in time to be helpful," Long said. "It's like a surgeon - you want one who does a good job."

The United States granted asylum to 13,520 people in 2005, according to Citizenship and Immigration Services statistics. People cam seek asylum if they fear persecution for returning to their countries because of their race, religion, nationality or political views. * * *

Individual judges have remarkable range in denying asylum, from 10 percent to more than 98 percent, according to a TRAC report last month.

Monday's release lets the public compare judges within each court or with others across the country. It also shows each judge's caseload by major nationalities.

Here is the TRAC database on immigration judges. And here is the link to to asylumlaw.org.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on August 10, 2006 08:06 AM
Posted to Courts in general