By Juan Mann
06/07/2005
[More by Juan Mann on Loretta Schloerb’s case:
Loretta Schloerb of New Jersey fought the immigration bureaucracy … and won!
As a mother, Loretta could not bear the prospect of the foreign national who repeatedly molested her daughter ten years ago being officially allowed to keep his green card and remain in the United States.
So she entered the behind-closed-doors realm of the federal immigration bureaucracy and testified against the child molester in U.S. Immigration Court proceedings in Newark, N.J., before the Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR).
Even after losing the fight initially in EOIR Immigration Court, Loretta did not give up. She enlisted the support of attorneys at the highest levels of the Office of the Principal Legal Advisor at the Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) division.
The government attorneys appealed the EOIR decision to the DOJ’s Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA).
And Loretta’s perseverance paid off.
On May 12, BIA member Neil P. Miller entered an order of deportation against the child molester, reversing the original EOIR Immigration Court ruling.
Legal Eagles can read the "unpublished" BIA decision here: Board of Immigration Appeals decision [PDF] — In re: Jose Barrios Castilla, dated May 18, 2005. (Note that only BIA decisions designated as "published" are effective as legal precedent that must be recognized by the federal government.)
The BIA decision in the Barrios case sustained an appeal filed by DHS/ICE attorney Susan G. Roy on behalf of the government. The decision reversed a December, 2003, decision by EOIR immigration judge William K. Strasser of Newark, N.J.
In Immigration Court, Strasser had originally allowed Barrios to remain in the United States, despite a 1995 conviction for endangering the welfare of a child through sexual conduct. Barrios is an uncle (by marriage) of Loretta’s daughter.
BIA member Miller threw the book at both Strasser and Barrios in reversing the discretionary grant of relief under Section 212 (c) of the Immigration Act.
Miller wrote:
"[T]he Immigration Judge appeared to look behind the conviction, [and] speculated that the respondent’s [Barrios'] criminal actions may have been related to alcohol use …
"Moreover, the Immigration Judge determined that because the respondent completed a 2-year program he demonstrated rehabilitation, but we [the BIA] cannot find that completion of a program necessarily demonstrates rehabilitation, especially since the respondent did not fully accept responsibility for his actions.
"We note the testimony of the respondent’s son who stated that he would not feel comfortable leaving his children alone with the respondent."
According to previous reports by Loretta, Barrios has remained detained in federal ICE custody at least throughout the appeal process since the DHS/ICE appealed Strasser’s original decision in December, 2003.
Whether Barrios will choose to fight the case further while remaining detained is unknown.
Technically, the May 12 decision by the BIA now constitutes the "final agency action" by the DOJ’s EOIR in the case. But criminal alien residents in EOIR proceedings are free to persist in filing appeals and motions to the bitter end, if they choose.
There will be no way to know whether Barrios is actually physically deported, unless Loretta happens to receive a courtesy call someday from the government with the good news.
As I've written at length — and as has been amplified by Michelle Malkin — the way the Immigration and Nationality Act and the federal immigration bureaucracy are rigged, EOIR Immigration Court proceedings are usually "not over until the alien wins."
But Loretta would have none of that!
She did everything in her power to see to it that the child predator who wreaked havoc on her family would be deported.
And because of her efforts, Loretta has provided VDARE.com readers with a rare glimpse into the EOIR Immigration Court process as it unfolded.
It’s an antidote to the pro-criminal alien sob-stories penned by the Treason Lobby’s handmaidens in the media.
Loretta’s insider account also exposes the public relations myth that the ICE’s Operation Predator (arresting sex offenders for immigration violations) is NOT a sure thing when it comes to getting predators actually deported.
In the federal immigration bureaucracy of EOIR Immigration Court and its appellate process, there’s unfortunately much more involved in getting a convicted child molester out of the country.
Sadly, Loretta learned the truth about the EOIR from the inside … and it wasn’t pretty.
But Loretta’s story is a mere day in the life of the federal immigration bureaucracy.
Just how many child predators and convicted criminal alien residents have been allowed by EOIR immigration judges to keep their "green cards" despite laundry lists of crimes … no one knows.
In fiscal year 2004, the EOIR granted over 33,000 applications for "relief" without specifying in its annual shameful statistics which applications involved criminal alien residents, and what type of relief applications were being granted. [See EOIR’s 2004 statistical yearbook, PDF page 19.]
Doesn’t America deserve to know the truth about how many criminal alien residents the EOIR is allowing to remain in the United States?
So until EOIR’s litigation-based system for deporting illegal aliens and criminal alien residents is abolished — and foreign criminals are summarily removed from our shores — America is going to need a lot more Lorettas.
This one woman’s extraordinary effort to obtain justice will be an historic part of the process by which Americans realize just what really goes on behind the EOIR’s closed doors.
Juan Mann is a lawyer and the proprietor of DeportAliens.com.
This is a content archive of VDARE.com, which Letitia James forced off of the Internet using lawfare.