Thread: Mother deported to Mexico 3 years ago wins chance to return

Originally published April 19, 2010 at 8:42 PM | Page modified April 19, 2010 at 9:04 PM

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Mother deported to Mexico 3 years ago wins chance to return

An illegal immigrant who lived in Washington for 17 years before being deported to Mexico three years ago may have the rare chance to come back for an immigration hearing after an appeals board, citing ineffective legal counsel, ordered her case reopened.

By Lornet Turnbull

Seattle Times staff reporter

Ana Reyes should have had a shot at a type of visa crime victims can get, the board ruled.

Ana Reyes' daughter Julie Quiroz, now 16, lives with a Texas couple to go to school in the U.S., her birthplace.

An illegal immigrant who lived in Washington state for 17 years before she was deported to Mexico three years ago may have the rare chance to come back for an immigration hearing after an appeals board, citing ineffective legal counsel, ordered her case reopened.

Local attorneys say the ruling potentially could open the door to a flood of filings by immigrants already deported from the country.

Ana Reyes, 43, is a mother of four whose 2007 deportation from the U.S. and subsequent struggle to scratch out a living for herself and her children in the poor barrios of Mexico City were chronicled by The Seattle Times.

Ordinarily, deportation would end any legal immigration claims Reyes or most other illegal immigrants might have in the U.S.

But the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) ruled recently that Reyes should at least have been considered for a type of visa available to crime victims who cooperate with criminal investigations.

The visa is meant to help illegal-immigrant crime victims overcome their fear of contacting police because they worry it may lead to deportation. Reyes has recounted in immigration-court documents years of domestic violence at the hands of her now-former husband, abuse she did report to police.

Petition for the so-called U visa might have averted her 2007 deportation, court documents show. And the board said failure by her two private attorneys to pursue the visa amounted to "ineffective assistance of counsel."

While the BIA did not demand that the government bring Reyes back, a new hearing was ordered, which her current attorney, Henry Cruz, said would require her presence in the U.S.

The immigration court in Seattle has set an Aug. 21 date.

"This is an unusual ruling, but it's also based on her prior attorneys mishandling her case," Cruz said. "There are a few published decisions out there, but this is still quite rare."

Cruz now must persuade U.S. Customs and Border Patrol to allow Reyes to enter the U.S. from Mexico under a kind of parole status.

It's not automatic — even with the court order. Border Patrol officials in San Diego say such requests are reviewed case by case.

Two sons also deported

When Reyes first came to Washington with her husband and two young sons, the family settled in Eastern Washington, where her boys grew up. She gave birth to two daughters — now 16 and 8 — in the U.S.

In 1991, her husband was arrested, convicted, spent two weeks in jail and ordered to take anger-management classes after he beat her. Five years later, neighbors called police after a domestic disturbance and, based in part on her statement to police, her husband was convicted of two counts of fourth-degree assault against her.

He was deported.

Reyes came to the attention of U.S. immigration authorities in 1998 after she was arrested for violating a restraining order. She'd gotten into a fight with another woman with whom she had an ongoing disagreement, and the woman took out a restraining order.

In 2001, Reyes and her children followed a wave of other Mexican fruit pickers taking construction, restaurant and hotel jobs in and around Seattle. She landed a job at SeaTac Crest Motor Inn and settled into an apartment in Burien.

An immigration judge in 2003 ordered her removed from the U.S., allowing her to leave voluntarily. She appealed on grounds that her U.S.-born daughters would be unable to adjust to life in Mexico. She lost the appeal but didn't leave the country.

On the morning of her 41st birthday — the day her eldest daughter would graduate from elementary school — Reyes was picked up in an early-morning raid on her home.

She was deported two weeks later. Her two sons also were deported, and her daughters joined her in Mexico weeks later.

Joe Kennard, a developer, philanthropist and former Edmonds resident who learned of Reyes' life in Mexico through accounts in The Seattle Times, hired Cruz to try to bring her back legally.

Such efforts often are seen as futile because the U.S. seldom allows the return of illegal immigrants it deports.

But Kennard is a stubborn man. A Christian now living in Texas, he said he prayed about Reyes' case, never doubting there was a way.

"We're not there yet, but this is a huge step forward," he said of the BIA ruling. "I'm just anxious to get her here and have it done, and then the process of getting the whole family over here legally can begin."

"It's a real step"

Julie Quiroz, Reyes' eldest daughter who has been living with Kennard and his wife in Texas so she can attend school in the U.S., broke the news of the BIA ruling to her mother.

"She wasn't sure what it meant initially, and really I wasn't sure, either," Quiroz said. "But I just told her it was good news. ... Finally, it's a real step."

In court documents related to Reyes' case, attorneys for the Department of Homeland Security argued that she hadn't pursued her claim of ineffective counsel with "due diligence," although they conceded she wouldn't have been deported had her attorneys pursued the U visa, even during the two weeks she was being held in detention in the U.S.

One of the two attorneys cited in Reyes' appeal was suspended by the Washington State Bar Association for unrelated complaints and no longer practices in the state. The other is facing possible disbarment as a result of numerous client complaints.

Reyes' current attorney first sought to reopen her case based on ineffective counsel in 2008. But the BIA rejected the motion, saying it lacked jurisdiction since Reyes had been deported.

Cruz appealed to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which sent her case back to the BIA for reconsideration.

Before the BIA could rule again, the 9th Circuit, in a separate decision, found that the forced removal of an immigrant should not preclude reopening of that person's case.

The BIA cited that 9th Circuit ruling in ordering Reyes' case reopened.

While Cruz was pursuing relief for Reyes in court, he also filed a separate U-visa application for her with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the division of Homeland Security that issues the documents.

That petition is pending. If Reyes is granted the visa, she could parlay it into a green card — and eventually citizenship.

But she first has to make it across the border. Once here, the immigration judge could choose to continue her case while her visa application was being processed, during which time Reyes could be granted a work permit.

Or the judge could order her removed again.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com

When Reyes first came to Washington with her husband and two young sons, the family settled in Eastern Washington, where her boys grew up. She gave birth to two daughters — now 16 and 8 — in the U.S.

In 1991, her husband was arrested, convicted, spent two weeks in jail and ordered to take anger-management classes after he beat her. Five years later, neighbors called police after a domestic disturbance and, based in part on her statement to police, her husband was convicted of two counts of fourth-degree assault against her.

He was deported





Excuse me.....but why are we in the habit of giving "victim visas" to illegal aliens who are the victims of crimes against them committed by other illegal aliens?

NONE of them should've been here in the first place!!!




Reyes came to the attention of U.S. immigration authorities in 1998 after she was arrested for violating a restraining order. She'd gotten into a fight with another woman with whom she had an ongoing disagreement, and the woman took out a restraining order.

In 2001, Reyes and her children followed a wave of other Mexican fruit pickers taking construction, restaurant and hotel jobs in and around Seattle. She landed a job at SeaTac Crest Motor Inn and settled into an apartment in Burien.

An immigration judge in 2003 ordered her removed from the U.S., allowing her to leave voluntarily. She appealed on grounds that her U.S.-born daughters would be unable to adjust to life in Mexico. She lost the appeal but didn't leave the country


And WHY are we even looking at giving a "victim visa" to this woman who......while crying for mercy as a victim of assault.....has assaulted and victimized somene herself, went on the run to hide from the authorities, and then disappeared again ignoring a deportation order?